


we all fall down

by vlrnlr



Category: DCU, DCU (Comics), Green Arrow (Comics), Green Lantern (Comics), Justice League of America (Comics)
Genre: ASD Oliver Queen, BPD Dinah Lance, Bisexual Characters, Canon Compliant, Canon Temporary Character Death, Cheating, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/M, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, Imperialism, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Pining, Polyamory, Slow Romance, Trans Dick Grayson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-18 22:14:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28874394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vlrnlr/pseuds/vlrnlr
Summary: Turns out there is a statute of limitations on saying the things you’re not supposed to say. / Pre-Flashpoint. Ollie, Hal, Dinah, and everything in between.
Relationships: Connor Hawke/Kyle Rayner, Dick Grayson/Roy Harper, Dinah Lance/Oliver Queen, Hal Jordan/Dinah Lance, Hal Jordan/Oliver Queen
Comments: 7
Kudos: 32





	1. Act I

**Author's Note:**

> By God, I will fill this ship tag all on my own if I have to. These three were even worse than DickRoy – hand in unlovable hand in unlovable hand…
> 
> References canon from Peacemakers (Legends of the DC Universe #7-9), JLA: Year One, GL/GA #7 (The Flash Vol. 1 #217-219), GA Vol. 2 #19-20, Zero Hour, GA Vol. 2 #96, GL: Rebirth (the preboot mini, not the Rebirth volume), and GL Vol. 3 #81. I adapted most of these though, as usual. Ollie’s backstory is compatible with _la reine est morte_ but you don’t have to have read that to be able to follow here.
> 
> The title is supposed to allude to the actual game of Ring-o’-Roses (or Ring-Around-the-Rosie to the Americans) and how it’s played, not any of the various songs that use that one line from the rhyme. Damn you, Misters Chemical Romance.

**Him. 1982.**

If you ask Ollie, pretty boys ought to come with some kind of warning label, you know? Something to say, like, _remember how your mama projected all her various issues onto you and taught you to never let yourself be emotionally vulnerable ’cause you can and will get screwed over. Well, this is it, this is the one, this is whom that was all about_. Something like that, and it should have been slapped across Hal’s fucking forehead the first time Ollie had ever seen him, stepping out of that mess tent, brown curls and brown eyes and brown bomber jacket all soft and warm looking, in the light of the setting sun.

( _Run before he destroys you!_ – and a smiley face. For emphasis.)

As it is, though, life ain’t quite that convenient, and Ollie is starved enough for some English-speaking company that he makes the mistake of calling out to him, for the singular reason that he’s the first face close enough to his own that he’s seen in weeks, you understand. Ollie’s jailers— sorry, _guardians_ — have sent the errant Queen down to civil-war-torn Minglia, to find out why the hell their ammunition keeps going missing or getting blown up “on accident”. “Every crate of arms we lose is money out of _your_ pocket, Oliver,” Walter Steele – acting COO of Queen Industries, and general douchebag overlord – had said. “At least _pretend_ to care about the company, will ya?”

So here he is, pretending, and Hal Jordan happens to be the only other American on base, as he finds out when he shouts, “Hey! You American?” and Mr. Shades of Brown turns and waves and calls back, “Yeah! Hal Jordan. Who are you?”

Ollie strides over to him, holding out a hand. “Oliver Queen. With Queen Industries.”

Hal takes it, shakes it, his eyebrows leaping to meet his hairline at the name. “You’re the money? What are you doing out here in person?”

This close, Ollie can tell that the bomber jacket is military issue. The name patch on it reads, _Jordan_. “Call it a fact-finding mission,” he says, deliberately vague, on the principle of erring on the side of caution and all. “Didn’t hear about the air force getting involved in this fracas.” (The US government was backing counterinsurgency efforts here in Minglia, that much he knew, but – still smarting from Vietnam – their aid this time around was supposed to be a little more hands-off, just putting the right toys in the right kids’ hands, sitting back, watching ’em tear the playground apart among themselves.)

Hal blinks. “Oh, I’m not— well, I mean, I _was_ , but not at the moment. I’m with Ferris Aircrafts? I’m a test pilot, they send me down to fly in the equipment for the Minglian government.”

“I see.” Wonderful – a peddler of the same trade, that trade being death and devastation. Ollie really wants a drink, the three-year sobriety chip in his shirt pocket be damned. “Say, what does a guy do for fun around here?”

“Well, there’s ping-pong, and softball…”

Seriously? Ollie can’t help but chuckle. “Hal. Buddy. Do I look like a boy scout to you?” He gets a nonplussed stare in response, so he sighs. “Women. Alcohol. Come on, you can’t be _that_ young. Doesn’t anybody ever go down to the village… taverns, or whatever the hell they got out here?”

“Inns, and no. But I could lend you a chess board if you want, and there’s backgammon in the mess tent—”

“Backgammon,” Ollie repeats, incredulous. “Okay, how old are you again?”

Hal looks confused. “Uh, twenty-four?”

“And you’re not with the military.”

“No.”

“So you _don’t_ have to take orders from anybody here?”

“Not unless—”

“You married? Is that it?”

“No? I mean, I have something like a girlfriend, I guess, we’re not _officially_ dating, but—”

“Yeah, that’s not normal. You’re not normal. You’re coming with me.” And Ollie promptly drags him, protests and all, out of the base with him.

One shabby inn and a surprisingly small amount of drinking later (Ollie’s _barely_ drunk, and shockingly still, doesn’t even mind it), they find themselves still chatting out on the wooden porch, the natives too wary of their uniforms to come anywhere close.

“—Call it rebellion. The government is friendly to the US, and the _rebels_ aren’t. Simple as that.”

“Yeah, well, some of us have trouble being quite that flippant about _military occupation_.”

“I’m hearing this from the guy that owns the ’munitions outfit?” Hal stares at him. “You might just be the biggest hypocrite I have ever met.”

“On the contrary.” Ollie sends him a crooked smile. “I’m the only non-hypocrite in the world.”

Hal scoffs. “How do you figure that?”

“I’m the only one who admits it.”

“…You’re something else.” Hal huffs an amused breath into his drink. “How old are _you_ , then? You talk like one of those… hippie peaceniks.”

“I’m only thirty,” Ollie insists, indignant. “But hell yeah, I marched against Vietnam in my time. And I’d do it again. I don’t remember voting for – ” he makes a vague gesture around – “ _This_.”

“Me neither, but I _did_ vote for the people that call the shots, so I _can_ trust _them_ to do their jobs right.”

“Come on. No way are you that stupid.”

Hal shrugs. Ollie braves eye contact and is more than a little gratified to see something like contemplation – if not remorse – in those unobtrusive browns. “…Theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die…”

“Tennyson,” Ollie blurts out.

“You don’t have to sound _that_ surprised.” Hal chuckles. “Yeah, I know it. A lot of soldiers and ex-soldiers will.”

“You don’t like it either, do you?” Ollie realises with a start. “Why do it, then?”

“My dad did.”

“You do everything your dad did?”

Hal laughs a little, though it rings hollow, and he makes a show of stretching his arms behind his head. “Well. It’s been fun, Ollie, but we better be heading back before it gets late enough for us to get ambushed and die a stupid death in the middle of nowhere.”

So much for that. “You go ahead. See you at mess tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Hal starts forward, pauses, and turns again. “One question.”

“Hit me.”

Hal squints at him, like he’s been called to the front of the class and Ollie is an impossible mathematical equation on the chalkboard. “How the hell does the heir to a billion-dollar fortune, built on _arms_ , end up marching against Vietnam? Like. How the hell would you square one with the other?”

 _With a_ lot _of alcohol_ , Ollie thinks and doesn’t say. Hey, he hasn’t seen a single woman in ages and Hal is plenty good-looking, so instead he grins, all swaggering, and all but sing-songs, “I’m full of mysteries.”

“…Sure,” Hal says again, less sceptical and more… considering.

* * *

**Him. 1982.**

_Full of mysteries_ doesn’t even _begin_ to describe Oliver Queen. Hal has just flown down, rigged out in full Green Lantern gear, has the ring pointed straight at his face, and this guy doesn’t even _flinch_. “I’ll only ask you one more time. What’s your name?” he demands, trying not to let it throw him off. The commanding resonance of his voice does absolutely nothing to unsettle the self-assured expression Ollie wears, however, and judging by the volumes that single arched eyebrow is speaking, the question – a last-ditch effort to salvage his secret identity – falls flat, too.

“And if I don’t feel like telling you? What are you gonna do – hit me with your big, bad ring?”

“Something like that.” Hal goes for menacing. “Something _very_ like that.”

Of-fucking-course he finds the hypocrite that rants about US imperialism over _casual drinks_ making friendly with the rebels. To think Hal’s heart had almost stopped when he’d heard about that stolen jeep getting blown up. Turns out Ollie is not only still in one piece, he’s living it up in a little commune full of insurgents. This goes beyond flouting the rules, this is potentially _treason_.

“If you don’t start—”

He’s interrupted by a sudden whistling through the air above them, and on instinct yells, “Incoming!” – as he shoots a dome-like construct around himself, Ollie, and the mysterious old man clad in all-white. The man pales, seemingly more shocked by what the ring had done than by the missile going off metres away from them, but though his eyes go wide Ollie still doesn’t look afraid.

“That is just about the _neatest_ trick I have ever seen!” he shouts above the noise of the explosion, gaping at Hal. “You don’t get a ring like _that_ from a Cracker Jack box…”

Disconcerted, Hal tries again. “Last chance. Your name.” He curls a fist up to flaunt the ring, figuring it’s proven itself a genuine threat at this point.

Ollie only rolls his eyes. “Oh, come on. If you’re not Hal Jordan, I’m Shirley Temple.”

Annoyed now, Hal shoots a hand-shaped construct out of the ring which grabs both Ollie and his companion and lifts them up into the air with him. The old man looks about to faint at this point. Ollie, on the other hand, stares like a kid seeing Disneyland for the first time.

“This is even neater than the last stunt! What kind of boxtop do I have to send in to get me one of those rings?”

“Somebody probably told you that you’re funny. They _lied_.” Hal glares. “Any reason I shouldn’t turn you over to the government as a traitor?”

“Well, for starters, I’m _not_ a traitor, even by your definition. The US has never declared war on this country. We’re here to _advise_ – and, oh yeah, to supply arms to the herd of goons who are depriving innocent farmers of their rights.”

“Innocent farmers? Lawless rebels! They tried to shoot down that last bomber we brought in – _with me still in it_. They’ve been copping your supplies and detonating whatever’s left— they blew up the jeep you stole to do… whatever it is you do in that, that Robin Hood getup.”

“Open your eyes, already, Jordan! The bomber you brought in literally _just_ tried to kill us – and my supplies? A _nun_ – who was running her own care centre for village children so traumatised by the shit they’ve seen in this hellhole that _they can’t even speak_ – a _nun_ just accidentally stepped on one of my _supplies_ and fucking _died_.” Ollie’s voice is trembling with awful rage, and his eyes are blazing. He’s only armed with a bow and arrows, yet somehow, Hal can feel his heart hammering a lot more than Ollie’s seemed to, while faced with the ring. “They didn’t blow up the jeep, _I_ blew up the jeep – by driving it over one of the landmines _your_ general planted, all around the so-called rebel camps. There’s children and elderly in here, for fuck’s sake! These people pulled me out of the wreckage and saved my life, if you call _them_ lawless rebels, well, so was Washington and that 1776 bunch of outlaws.”

“Look, I get it, you don’t like that there’s innocent casualties in this conflict. I don’t, either! But that doesn’t _change_ the fact that the _broader_ cause here is—”

“Is what? Is democratic? Is liberating? Is _just_?” Ollie makes a violent, sweeping gesture toward the man still caught in Hal’s other plasmic fist. “I’ll show you _just_. This here’s Than. He’s a monk. He’s here to arrange peace talks between the government and the freedom fighters. The fucking _UN_ knows all about him – call someone at the embassy and verify it, if you want. If I lied, you can skin me alive. Or worse – I’ll play _backgammon_ with you.”

Hal’s eyes flick to the monk, uncertain. “…So?”

“ _So_ , how come your precious Ferris bomber knew to drop in on the camp where he’s known to be passing through, and _no other camp_ in the vicinity? You have their Intel. You _know_ they know more rebel hideaways than this one.”

“What are you saying…? That the counterinsurgents don’t _want_ the peace talks to happen?”

“Why would they?” Ollie snorts. “The day the hostilities end, the cash cow dies. No more sudden influx of money from sympathetic foreign shmucks like us. No more lining pockets like _mine_ for more mass-murder weapons.”

Hal frowns. “That’s a tall claim to be making with no proof.”

“We have… proof,” the monk speaks up at last, in careful, halting English. “We have, what you would call counterintelligence. Tapes that General Zho wishes me dead. Possible… unrest, planned for the summit. No more than this.”

“Nothing that can touch the American corporations, he means.” The passion in Ollie’s eyes dulls into something almost self-loathing. “But it’s a start. Hal, put me down. Believe us and help us or don’t, I don’t care. You can go call headquarters on me after you put me down, just… give us a chance to bury the dead here.”

It’s the genuine grief in his face and in his voice that makes Hal relent. Whatever else Ollie may turn out to be, dishonest was not it, and Hal is dead certain of that, all of a sudden. He carefully lowers them all, and then sends a solemn nod in Ollie’s direction. “I’ll confirm what you said. If you’re lying to me…”

“Do what you want,” Ollie answers. He doesn’t snap, but it’s no less dismissive.

And maybe a little disappointed, Hal thinks, idly wondering why.

* * *

It does turn out that the counterinsurgency is a total sham, but even when Hal switches sides Ollie gives him the silent treatment well until the summit. And even then, he doesn’t say more than what is strictly necessary for Green Arrow and Green Lantern to coordinate their efforts to help thwart Zho’s coup. It awakens a sinking feeling in his gut which only makes Hal defensive. What does he care what a complete and utter— a self-righteous, hypocritical— rich, white, privileged, out-of-touch _champagne socialist_ like Oliver Queen thinks about his morals?

And then he gets back home.

And he turns on the TV.

“—To announce the immediate dissolution of our arms subsidiary. Every stockholder will be fully reimbursed, and whatever money remains will be poured into the war relief efforts in Minglia.”

Hal’s hand freezes on the remote. He realises he’s gawking at Ollie’s face, behind that podium on the screen, but he can’t bring himself to stop.

“I’m no politician. I have no power to say when, where, or why we send our troops out to kill and to be killed. But what I _do_ have is the power to say— that I can no longer, in good conscience, let my company continue to be involved in it. Queen Industries stands, and will continue to stand for technological research and mechanical innovation. But these things should be used to further progress – not to take us back to a world of mindless violence and bloodshed.”

“…Son of a bitch.” Hal all but gasps.

Tom blinks up at him, puzzled.

Hal shakes his head. Continues watching. The news anchor is calculating the losses this decision will cost Queen Industries – _millions_ – as the audio from the press conference is cut off. Judging by the expressions on their faces, the announcement had come as a shock to Ollie’s men, too. Several of them, in smart suits behind him, look harried, milling among themselves, trying to talk to him – but he brushes them all off and steps off the podium.

He ignores the reporters, and walks away.

The screen changes to a different news item.

Tom whistles, says, “Wonder if Ferris is ever gonna make that call. But then, you’d be out of a job, Hal.”

Hal leaps out of his seat and rummages around the break room for the yellow pages, ignoring Tom’s questions. “Q, Q, Q— yup, got it.” It’s a big stretch to expect reception at Queen Industries to patch him through to the CEO for no good reason, so once he’s on the phone he says the magic lie (“independent inquiry into events relating to Minglian…”), and soon enough, Ollie’s on.

“Hello?”

“You _literally_ put your money where your mouth is.”

“…Jordan?” the voice on the other end says, incredulous. “What are you calling me here for?”

“Well, you didn’t exactly leave a home number. Listen, Ollie, I didn’t say, but I live up in Coast City – I mean, we’re practically neighbours.”

“Sure, if you have a magic ring that lets you fly,” Ollie returns, in typical sarcastic fashion.

“Or a crappy truck named Rosebud. Can we talk over coffee or something? You aren’t seriously planning to pout forever.”

“…Why?”

“Gimme a chance to defend my honour.”

Silence, for a minute, and then Ollie says, “Rosebud… like a fisting joke, or Citizen Kane?”

Hal colours. “Citizen Kane, you asshole!”

They meet up in a dainty little café tucked into a side street, at the City Core. Choose to sit outside, under a plain white parasol. Ollie seems a lot more… _constrained_ , in Star, which is odd when Hal considers _Minglia_ had been the literal warzone. Hal had thought the stuffy suit he’d worn on the news was all wrong on him, especially with the beatnik-style facial hair, so it’s a relief to see him in a regular sweater and pants. “They’re gonna crucify me for that move,” Ollie drawls, stirring his coffee idly. “If I don’t get a fucking _hit_ put out on me, they’re gonna do their damnedest to cheat me out of the CEO chair – and my fortune, bunch of snakes.”

“You don’t sound all that disappointed,” Hal observes.

Ollie shrugs. “Guess a better man would have been more grateful for his blessings. Me, I’m just tired of the burden, Hal. You know when I was marooned on that island?”

“Yeah, I read about that…”

“First time in a long time I’d ever felt free. Sitting on this much money when there’s people starving out there— I’m cursed with knowing it. Having it, and knowing it.”

Hal nods, wrapping both hands around his cup. “I know what you must think, but… I’m not a bad person, Ollie. I swear. Look – I’m from a military family. I never learnt to question the reasons why this country does what it does.”

“I don’t think you’re a bad person.” Ollie shakes his head. “I’m a billionaire, bud. My peers have always been people that could wave away an oil spill, or rape a girl at a frat party and get away with barely a slap on the wrist. They’re also my _peers_. I play golf with ’em. They kiss their wives and tuck their kids in at night. It’s comforting to believe bad people exist. The truth is scarier – that we’re all the same kind of human, and yet _so_ capable of _so much_ cruelty, given the means and opportunity. Given the chance to get away with it.”

“You think that way all the time, you’re gonna go insane.”

“Why do you think I drank so much?” Ollie huffs, then seems to decide a change of subject would be prudent – though Hal gets the sense that if he could have gone on, he would have, the light in his eyes going duller and duller and duller.

“…Damn, you really are paying attention, huh.”

Hal blinks, caught off guard. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Ollie breathes a silent laugh. “I don’t tend to like most people, ’cause most people don’t listen. Which is fair, all I ever wanna talk about is how the entire world is royally screwed. But I mean, if _you_ could see a train heading full throttle for your face, why _wouldn’t_ you scream? I don’t know, though. Guess you’re right. Most people just wanna stay sane. It’s not like the average person can do shit about anything.” He broods at his pancakes.

“You did something,” Hal offers.

“Still blood on my hands, pal. Still blood on my hands.”

Hal takes another sip. “I wanted to do something too, you know. After Minglia. I tried to look up the kid that shot one of your arrows at General Zho. Thought I’d donate to his legal fees.”

“Oh?” Ollie hums, serene.

“…Yeah.” Hal narrows his eyes, though, truth told, a smile is fighting to pull at one corner of his lips. “Turns out he never got near a police station, though. They said someone put him on a boat with a big wad of cash in his pocket. Last they’d heard, he’s been granted refugee status in a country with no extradition.”

Ollie meets his eyes, his own dancing. “Good.”

“I don’t know. Shouldn’t he have been tried under the law?”

“The law is whatever cops and judges decide it is.”

“ _No_ , the law is the accumulated wisdom of centuries. The glue that holds civilisation together. Without the law, what would prevent the bullies from running the world?”

“How did the law prevent a bully like _Zho_ from getting control of it, again?” Ollie challenges. “I say, obey the law until what it says conflicts with higher morality. Then, go with the morality.”

“And _I_ say that no single man will ever be able to judge what a higher morality is,” Hal counters. “Nobody’s that smart.”

“Smarts ain’t necessary. Everyone knows in his gut when some things are wrong—”

“So that kid almost killing a man isn’t wrong anymore?”

“Almost killing a _potential dictator_.”

Hal snorts. “Funny you’re against the concept of law, Ollie, you’d have made a swell lawyer.”

“So say that someone wealthy and sympathetic to his motivations really did help that kid escape trial. And say this person confesses to it. As a courtesy.” He holds Hal’s gaze in a level, piercing stare. “What happens then? He gets ratted out to _the law_?”

“…No,” Hal tells his cup a little ruefully. “No, not in this scenario.”

Ollie smiles, then – a real smile, dimpled and strangely sweet, not one of his smug crooked grins. “Hal, I think you gotta outgrow some grade-level brainwashing, but I also think you’re a decent guy.” He holds out a hand. “Friends?”

Amused, Hal takes it. Shakes it. “Something like that.”

* * *

**Her. 1987.**

It doesn’t seem like such an obvious choice, anymore, is the thing. Not now. Not with Carol and Ollie in the picture. But believe it or not, at the beginning of it all, it was Hal she thought she’d be with.

Hal, with his clean-cut good looks, and friendliness, and conventionality… assertive, but not dominating; daring, but not rebellious; open, but not eager; pretty much the definition of _safe_. Dinah, that’s what she’d always known she’d been missing – safe – so because her sense of self-preservation had still been intact, then… sure, she’d made her move on him, back in the early days of the League.

She remembers them post-first-superhero-mission, her saying, “Until we settle the mystery of what happened here – ” (they had just stopped a possible alien invasion, as you do) – “Maybe we should stick together. Like a team.”

And Hal, not taking his eyes off of her, something of a flirtation in that grin of his as he answers, “If _she_ thinks it’s a good idea, I’m in.”

Or she and Barry looking on in fond exasperation as he works his charm on a crowd of reporters, who had by then already started thinking of him as the unofficial JLA leader and spokesman.

“Maybe we should just change our name to _the Green Lantern Corps_ ,” she mutters, sarcastic, but she can’t help smiling.

Barry smiles back. “I think that, like me, you find this more amusing than irritating. Besides, of course he’s going to get all the attention. He’s the prettiest.”

“You have me there. He _is_ cute, isn’t he?”

Barry laughs. “I was joking, but I’ll take your word for it.”

Hal had been like some paragon of heroism in everybody’s eyes, back then – of a flavour much more accessible than Clark, who had felt fantastical and almost godlike. In her mid-twenties, his attention had made her feel all grown up and competent at last, given her the confidence to take as much initiative as she could on a team full of older men. It’s why she pulls whatever strings she can to arrange for the first ever press conference they hold as an official team to be held in the same hotel that the JSA itself had debuted in. She’s a legacy – a _real_ legacy, unlike Hal and Barry – and she could damn well prove it, is her reasoning.

She makes sure to sit right next to him, during. They watch Arthur stumble through a statement to the reporters. “Poor guy,” she whispers, her smile teasing, but not cruel. “So uncomfortable. He’s a regular Dr. Mid-Nite in front of a crowd…”

“Again with the JSA references.” Hal laughs, barely any sound, just a sudden huff of warm breath against her cheek. “You sure do love those old heroes.”

It’s such an easy game to play. She leans in, effortless, glances up at him through her long lashes. “Frankly, I prefer _young_ heroes even more.” Single flutter of the eyelids – not a wink, which would be too much too fast – “You say you’re powerless against yellow? Does that…” – careful fingers gently resting on his arm – “…Extend to blondes?”

His Adam’s Apple bobs, up-then-down, and vague pink spreads across the bridge of his nose where it meets his domino mask. Victory. “As a matter of fact…”

Barry seems to have taken over for Arthur, at that exact moment, with a joke that takes a nosedive and promptly falls flat on its face. And so Hal sighs, distracted.

“’Scuse me while I spin this a bit.”

She leans back in her chair, watches as he takes the mic from his best friend. He proceeds to basically ooze charisma in the general direction of the questions and flashing cameras, as per, but they’re immediately interrupted by supervillains bursting through. Just another Tuesday. Taking them down does do half of Hal’s work for him, though, and by the end of the brawl, their brand-new Justice League of America is suddenly an indisputable crowd favourite. “Someone actually wants us _dead_ ,” Barry hisses through the smile they’d all slapped on for the people outside. “First time I’m playing for stakes like that. Is that the world we’re in now? Am I wrong to be a little nervous?”

Dinah rolls her eyes. “So someone’s after us. What does that tell us?”

“That we’re doing something right,” Hal finishes for her, as if they’d somehow paired off already.

She grins. “You _are_ fearless.”

Barry looks dejected; Hal, smugly pleased. He’d been about to lean in, she’s sure of it now, maybe to wrap an arm around her shoulders or her waist, maybe even to ask if they could kiss. But then another mic is thrust in front of his face, and a rapid voice follows it: “—Group of showboaters calling themselves _superheroes_! Gotham Hotel – shattered! Bystanders – endangered! City – traumatised! What’s _super_ about that? What do you have to say for yourselves?”

Hal doesn’t get a chance to say a thing, though. Dinah feels an odd flick of air that kisses a lock of her wig as it blows past, sharp and thin as a needle. Then the grating feedback from the mic as it malfunctions. Then the realisation that it had, in fact, been skewered by— an arrow?

“I call that one my anti-loudmouth arrow.”

She turns in the direction of the sarcastic voice. It’s hardly the kind of impression that Hal had left on her, the first time she had met him. Ollie had still been donning that Robin Hood getup, silly feather in his hat and all. His eyes hadn’t once turned to look at her, anyway, only Hal, like the rest of them are hardly worth the attention.

“Green Arrow,” Hal says, surprised, and Dinah looks on in curiosity as his smile changes into something more… warmly amused, than swaggering, for once.

“No need to thank me.” Ollie mirrors the look in spite of the sarcasm still dripping from his voice. As if at an unspoken signal, they then immediately turn back, Ollie continuing to antagonise the reporter – “I’m gonna bring a suit against you, just you wait!” “So long as it’s not _that_ one – who’s your tailor, the Joker?” “I’ll nail you for that!” “Yeah? If you need a hammer, use your head.” – until he gives up, leaves Hal well and truly alone. Hal, in turn, is politely dismissing the rest of the crowd.

And then, in perfect harmony once again, they regroup, just like that. She’s the only one close enough to eavesdrop, without really meaning to.

“Thanks for the assist.”

“Don’t mention it. I saw the conference on the news and figured I had more experience dealing with paparazzi than you do.”

“Har-har.”

“Starting a little club, eh?”

“If you want in—”

“Hmm. Pass. You guys will need funding, though, for a project like this.” He says it matter-of-factly, ignoring the way Hal’s eyes very nearly pop out of his head, behind the mask.

“Ol— Arrow, we can’t possibly—”

“You can, and should.” Ollie smiles that crooked smile of his. Dinah hadn’t known yet, that it was reserved for a very select group of people, but something about their easy camaraderie piques her interest regardless. “Just write me off for a lifetime’s worth of birthday presents and we’ll call it even. I can never remember when yours is.”

Hal sighs, exasperated. “At least stay and meet the people you’re sponsoring, then.” And he forces Ollie forward, the couple of steps required to bridge the distance to the rest of them. “Guys, this is Green Arrow. Green Arrow, this is guys. Flash. Martian Manhunter. Aquaman. Black Canary.”

Dinah never forgets that first time, not because of some mystical sense of premonition, not even because Ollie’s eyes flick toward hers and then linger, but because he does the most charming thing next: he tips his hat in her direction, like a cowboy in an old-fashioned Western.

“ _One_ female superhero. How incredibly progressive of you, Ha— Lantern.”

Dinah obliges with a grin. “Right?”

“It’s not like I planned it that way,” Hal protests, miffed.

“Will you be joining us, Green Arrow?” J’onn asks.

Ollie sizes them up, something almost condescending in his eyes. Dinah has to resist the bizarre urge to straighten her wig. “Hmm. No, thanks.” He turns to Hal again. “Call me about the thing – we’ll sort the details out between my people. Later, flyboy.” And then he turns.

Leaves.

“Weird fella,” Barry remarks.

“Not the most social,” Hal says, like an apology, “But he’s a good guy. Got friends in high places. He said they would help us with the financing.”

Barry’s face brightens. “I take it back.”

She doesn’t think much of their encounter, though, and as soon as it’s over, it retreats to the back of her mind, which returns its full attention to charming her potential knight in green armour. But the very things that had attracted her to Hal in the first place end up giving her pause, in the end. He’s handsome, he’s stable, he’s much too _obvious_ , which is why she decides she’s better off cutting it short.

Or at least, that’s what she tells herself.

(Barry talks about Iris West with that disgusting love-light in his eyes, and Dinah tries not to glower, tries not to think him capable of eating all those rhapsodies the instant another, prettier skirt walks by, but he’s a man and men are too fucking easy, and there’s no way he’s the exception to the rule. Fiancée, indeed. Love of his life, indeed. They’re checking out the newly-constructed trophy room on Mount Justice, and he just won’t shut up about Iris, and her mind keeps veering to Mom and Uncle Ted, and all those furtive glances that mean so much more, now, with all the cruel privilege of hindsight. So she changes the subject with some dumb question about Hal – “He’s a little headstrong… but then, I’m pretty methodical, so it balances out. Maybe that’s what all us Midwesterners think about Californians, though. He’s a good guy,” Barry obliges – so then she cuts him off with a smoky smile, and whispers, “So are you,” and then, “My dad worked in law enforcement,” and then, “I like cops.” He freezes, as she winds her arms around his shoulders. His eyes are on her lips. So much for Iris West, Dinah thinks, half triumphant, half enraged. And that’s how Hal Jordan walks in on her kissing his best friend.)

* * *

In the aftermath of their final battle with Locus, Barry wades through rubble to get to his fiancée, to take her in his arms, and kiss her out of sheer relief at finding her still alive. Dinah looks on as a numbing cold fills her chest. She wonders what they’re talking about with those glistening eyes and beaming smiles and suddenly knows with dread certainty that it’s _her_. That Barry has to be calling her a bad decision. And she realises… that _he_ might not have been the problem, after all, and she’s really, _really_ mad at her mom.

The by-now familiar swish of disturbed air pulls her out of her mind and makes her jerk her head up in perfect time to watch the arrows sailing above it, lodging in the creature that had almost attacked her while she’d been distracted. It falls to the ground with a giant _thump_ , and she turns back around to find the pair that had saved her life.

Noticing her noticing him, Ollie takes his hat off and bows. “Green Arrow, at your service.” He straightens, puts it back on, throws her a wink and a dashing grin.

“And Speedy!” says the boy in red, next to him, indignant. “Remember me? Of course not, there’s a _girl_ around.”

“Hey! Come here, you.” Ollie pulls him into a loose headlock, and there’s some affectionate roughhousing for a minute, and Dinah realises she’s smiling, as she watches their scuffling. Abruptly, out of nowhere, she’s overcome with grief, the missing piece of her heart in the shape of her own father threatening to swallow her up. Tears leap to her eyes and she can’t quite hide them in time for Ollie not to notice.

“Whoa, are you okay?” He steps forward, his eyes going round.

“Shit,” Dinah swears, hiding her face in her hands, angry beyond belief. “Please don’t let Flash or Lantern see me…”

“Sure can do.”

Confused, Dinah watches him pull out a strangely-shaped arrowhead and screw it onto one of his shafts. He stretches his bowstring, nocks it.

“Roy, you gonna be okay with Uncle Hal for a second? I won’t be long.”

Speedy, Roy, crosses his arms. “I’m not a baby.”

“Okay, well, stay put. —Gonna need you to turn around for a bit, Canary.”

Still caught off guard, Dinah takes a minute to register that he’s talking to her, and she hastily turns. There’s a fizzing sound— then a burst like a distant firecracker— and then one solid, glove-covered hand clasps hers and pulls the both of them forward, quick as possible, to get out of range of the apparent smokescreen arrow he’d shot over his shoulder.

“Wh— overkill!” Dinah half-gasps, half-laughs, incredulous.

“Hey, you said not to let them see ya. Where’d you park your motorcycle?”

“Around the corner—”

He starts in that direction, and Dinah takes the lead when they approach the alleyway. Ollie gestures toward her motorcycle in a _right-this-way-ma’am_ fashion, as if she can’t see it for herself, which is funny enough to break through the melancholy and make her laugh again. “Thank you,” she mumbles, embarrassed that she’s still sniffing and red-eyed.

“Sorry I don’t have a _tissue arrow_ , but I do have…” he pulls one out of his quiver, snaps the head of it in half— then starts yanking out a string of handkerchiefs, like one of those magic tricks, earning some more laughter. “…One of Speedy’s gag gifts, which I never thought would actually turn out useful.” He undoes the knot on one of them and hands it to her with a sheepish grin.

“Thanks,” she repeats, still chuckling a little as she uses it to dab at her eyes. “That’s sweet… Speedy, is he your son?”

“No, not yet. He’s my ward, I— can’t really figure a good time to bring up adoption. ’Specially not now, he’s at that age when saying anything implying he’s still a kid is an insult, you know?” He sounds fond and proud the way loving parents do even when it isn’t their children’s achievements that are being discussed. “Everything, uh, alright back there?”

She fiddles with the cloth in her hands, nodding miserably. It’s because Ollie isn’t on the League – isn’t likely to get involved in their drama – that she says anything at all. “Looks like Barry, um. Fixed things with Iris. So.”

“Far be it from me to start preaching, but nine times out of ten the married guy doesn’t leave his wife for his mistress, you know.” His voice is kind, not that that makes it sting any less. “Even the worst ones are more likely to wanna have their cake and eat it too.”

She glares. “Well, you _are_ preaching, and to the fucking choir. My mom had an affair with one of her old teammates while my dad was still around.”

“Yeah, my dad was the same.” He nods, unfazed by her anger. “Wasn’t all on him, though. He was an asshole, but my mama wasn’t the most affectionate spouse in the world, either.”

“Well, _my_ dad didn’t deserve it.” She crosses her arms, her voice trembling. “I only just found out – about Mom and Uncle Ted, that is. Truth told, I… I didn’t really care about Barry. Not in that way. I guess… I might have been reeling from the news, and… trying to prove a nasty point.” Her grip around her own upper arms tightens. “God, I’m a terrible person…”

“No such thing as terrible people. Only terrible choices.” He shrugs. “Your logic checks out, anyway. I’m sorry.”

“For me?” She scoffs wryly. “Don’t be. Save it for Iris.”

“She’ll have plenty of that coming her way. From me as well, but it’s also sad about your dad and all.”

The tears well up again. “He was a very good man, he… died when I was about Speedy’s age.”

“That’s awful.”

She sends him a strained, humourless smile. “Mom always joked that I loved him more than I did her. And— now that I _know_ , I wonder if… maybe I could grow to really resent her like she…”

“I think if anything’s to be taken away from this situation, it’s that people’s mistakes don’t define them,” he answers thoughtfully. “If you can forgive yourself, you can forgive her.”

Dinah nods, unconvinced, but grateful for his lack of condemnation.

“Your mom – would that be the old Black Canary?” Ollie hums. “A teammate on the _JSA_? Man. Sure wrecks their image of the wholesome heroes of yesteryear.”

“Is that your idea of comfort?”

“Oh, I’m the wrong person to turn to for that,” he says, sheepish. “But I can give you plenty of _sympathy_. Been young and impulsive.”

At least he’s honest, she concedes, rueful. “Have you ever been married?”

“Sure. Up until she left me for a duke of someplace European.”

Dinah stares. He chuckles under his breath, then takes off the mask, revealing startlingly green eyes. “Oliver Queen. Yes, that one.”

“That explains so much and yet nothing at all.” Her laugh is startled. “Next you’re gonna tell me our own resident playboy-billionaire is the Batman.”

“Who, Wayne? Please. I accidentally hit him on the knee with a croquet mallet once and he wouldn’t stop crying for his butler.”

Chuckling in amusement, she takes off the wig as well. “Dinah Lance. Not quite _pleased_ to meet you, but… appreciative.”

“Well, this looks cosy.” She turns at the new voice and finds herself staring up at Hal, who’s hovering a little ways outside the alley, a smile that’s oddly plastic, like the kind he tends to give the reporters, on his face. “Was wondering what the deal was with that smokescreen.”

“Accident,” Ollie lies with a little, crooked grin. “What’s up?”

“Nothing, just checking to see you’re okay.”

“You’re like a jealous mother hen, Hal Jordan.”

“Mother hen, I’ll take. Jealous – you _might_ be giving yourself a little too much credit.” And he sounds fond, but doesn’t acknowledge Dinah at all. “You better get back to Roy, though, he seems a little miffed about being brushed off for your, uh, lady-friend.”

“Lady-friend?” Dinah snorts. “We barely just arrived at the _friend_ part.”

“I swear I’ll never get the hang of when that boy wants my attention and when he’d prefer I let him be.” Ollie sighs, but he puts his mask back on. “Okay, well. See ya around, Miss Lance.”

“Just Dinah’s fine.” She smiles.

“Then call me Ollie,” he returns, mirroring it. And he goes.

“Do you need my help with the clean—?”

“You sure move fast,” Hal cuts her off, his smile disappearing. He lands on his feet, crosses his arms. His lips are pursed.

Dinah feels the humiliation roll through her being like a languid wave, her cheeks turning hot. “Excuse me?”

“I don’t care about what might or might not have been between _us_. Maybe you led me on on purpose – maybe I just misread everything. Either way, I’m more than capable of taking the punch and moving on. But why are you doing this to my _friends_?”

“Wh— I’m not some— some conniving _femme fatale_ like you seem to think!” she splutters back, insulted. “Barry could have turned me down. He _didn’t_. Some of it was on him.”

Hal shakes his head. In a disgusted voice he adds, “Well, good luck playing your little games on Ollie. I think you’ll find he isn’t anything like Barry, and maybe you’ll learn a much-needed lesson about messing with other people’s _feelings_.”

“You don’t know the first goddamn thing about me, Jordan,” she grits out. “And if you don’t mind your business, I might just decide to settle this like a _superhero_.”

He scoffs. “Oh, I know all I need to know about women like you. You always need to have the upper hand. Always toy with men you’re smarter than, men you _know_ you can control. All of it to hide the fact that deep down, you’re nothing but a scared little girl, and you’ll never feel _anything_ like a real connection to _anyone_.”

Eyes wide, she lunges forward in rage, until she’s glaring up at him right in front of his face. “Fight me without hiding behind that ring like a coward and I’ll show you _exactly_ how scared of men I am, you bastard.”

“I didn’t say you were scared of men.” Cruel smile. “You’re scared of _love_ , Dinah, and I might sympathise with you for whatever it was that destroyed your ability to trust, but if you never quit treating relationships like chess, _newsflash_ , you’re about as bad as whoever disillusioned you. But please, feel free to try it on Ollie. On somebody with a _spine_.” He glares. “You will never, _ever_ have a hold over him.”

The anger boils over, into something much closer to stone-cold than eruptive. She seethes, thinking about Mom and Uncle Ted again, about furtive glances loaded with meaning. “Well,” she says coolly, meeting his eyes head on. “Then I guess it stands to reason… neither will _you_.”

He freezes.

Dinah gives him a slow, vindictive smirk. “Who’d have thought. Green is a sickening colour on you, after all.”

Then she turns on her heel and storms off, fuming.

* * *

**Them. 1987.**

Dinah laughs with her whole body, her head dropping onto Ollie’s shoulder like a book missing a prop on a spacious shelf. She’s barely emptied half of the one bottle of beer she had ordered, is the thing, though – and Ollie gets the odd sense that she’s playing it up for somebody else’s benefit. The only other person at their table being Hal, he has to assume these two observations are connected. The likeliest conclusion is that Dinah’s into Hal, and pretending she’s trying to come on to Ollie to make him jealous, but that doesn’t explain why Hal, on the flipside, has been such a sourpuss all evening.

“—And so then she moved out here, to be with my dad. Opened up our own little flower shop.”

“What’s it called?” Ollie obliges.

“Pretty Bird Florist’s.” She tries to wrap an arm around his bicep, as she smiles up at him, but Ollie subtly (he hopes) reaches for his own drink before she can. Dinah may be trying to play Hal, but that doesn’t mean Ollie has to help her. Feels wrong doing that to his closest friend, and besides, he’d rather Dinah make any advances on him only if she means it.

(When he looks over, he realises Hal seems smugly pleased, all of a sudden. He’s starting to get the sense he’s missing something.)

“Apt. There sure is one hell of a pretty bird in there,” he can’t help saying to Dinah, regardless, hoping it sounds teasing and platonic. Well, she is. Pretty. Interesting, too. He’s starting to notice there being a clear distinction between Dinah-with-the-wig-on and Dinah-without: the blonde bombshell who just oozes confidence and has all the men on her team wrapped around her finger in spite of her age, versus the short-haired punk with the tension in her shoulders and glare in her eyes reminiscent of a cornered animal that’ll only take one provocation to get violent.

He wonders which one is the truth.

“Dinah, are you _sure_ you gave the rest of the team the right address?” Hal speaks up, then. “I’m not celebrating the win against Locus all on our own, and I can’t wait here forever either, I got work in the morning.”

“Of course I am. Why would I give them the wrong bar on purpose?” Dinah arches an eyebrow – almost in challenge, Ollie notes, confused.

“…Why would you, indeed,” Hal mutters through gritted teeth.

“Come on, lighten up. I prefer this to the idea of drinking with the rest of your rabble, anyway,” Ollie says it like a peace offering, despite not being certain what conflict he’d unwittingly walked into. “I thought I’d have to slip out early tonight, but now? The company’s perfect.”

Whatever sentiment that had expressed, it seems to do the trick, and both Dinah and Hal seem less like circling leopards waiting to pounce.

“I still say we should go looking for the others. They may all be metahuman, but this is still Gotham,” Hal insists. “Can you imagine if Arthur were to get lost out _there_?”

“Fine.” Dinah sighs, annoyed. “Okay, then, _leader_. Lead on.”

She takes her beer bottle with her, as she stands. Ollie and Hal both choose to leave their drinks behind, seeing as theirs had both been alcohol-free and pretty pointless. And then they step out into a chilly spring evening, the wind biting but feeble. It’s when they pass through the first alley that Ollie tenses.

“…Shadow.”

“What?” Hal blinks, stopping along with him.

Ollie nods at the ground ahead of them. “Shadow. Doesn’t belong to the fire escapes or that one line of washing above us. Look.”

“Observant,” Dinah remarks, impressed. They step forward with more caution, in case a fight is looking for _them_ , up on the rooftops.

Sure enough, before they can turn the corner to return to the main street, a rustle of cloth whispers through the air and then two figures drop in front of them, silhouetted by the darkness and moonlight.

“Green Lantern. Black Canary. Green Arrow.”

Dinah had startled and Hal had reflexively pulled the ring out of his pocket, but Ollie only scowls, crossing his arms. “Spooky. Fancy seeing you again so soon.”

Batman steps out of the shadows. “I’m here to discuss some things about your… Justice League.”

“How do you know who we are?” Hal sounds unsettled by it.

“Because he’s Batman!” says an enthusiastic voice, and it’s only then that Ollie registers that behind the cape is a little—

“Is that a _child_!?” He points one accusing finger at the brightly-coloured sprite.

Dinah turns to him, puzzled. “Don’t you also have a sidekick?”

“Yeah, to park the fucking Arrowcar when I’m on a hunt so he feels included, not to be out on patrol at night! _On a school night!_ ”

“I’m not a child! I’m thirt—”

“Robin,” Batman warns, and he quiets, only muttering, “…Kid Flash is younger than me…”

“Let’s not waste time,” Batman growls. “I want to make it clear to you that the JLA is _not_ welcome in Gotham. Yesterday’s fighting was the worst, but not the first instance your presence in my city has caused that much damage. Metahuman superheroes tend to attract metahuman _supervillains_. This place has enough problems without external threats, and not on that scale.”

“Hold on— are you _ordering_ us to keep out?” Hal frowns. “What authority do you have to do that?”

“Yeah, fucker, I’ve been here longer than you have!” (Okay, maybe Dinah _is_ a little bit drunk.) “Where do you get off telling the Black goddamn Canary not to operate on her home turf?”

“You’re one person. An entire organisation is a different matter.”

“Giving them a little too much credit, there, Batsy. I’d say it’s a superhero club. At best.” Ollie makes a so-so gesture with his hand.

Hal tilts his chin up, stubborn and defiant. “We’re not ignoring alerts from Gotham City just because you said so.”

“We have things under control here. We don’t need you.” The eye-slits in Batman’s cowl narrow.

“And if supervillains _do_ attack without our prompting, what then? Throw a couple batarangs at an incoming alien invasion?”

“I’m only sparing the courtesy of speaking to you about this at all because you claim to be allies. Make no mistake, if you turn out to be otherwise, I _will_ respond accordingly.”

Okay, and _that’s_ definitely a threat. Hal slips the ring on and in a flash of green light is all decked out in space-cop glory. Dinah smashes her beer bottle against the nearest wall, holds it out like she’s seriously going to attempt to stab the McFreaking Batman as if he’s a handsy drunk in a bar brawl, and Ollie’s so caught up gawking at that, he forgets to do anything at all.

But then, quicker than anyone can react, Batman’s hand clamps down on his kid’s shoulder and he pulls them both back into the shadows behind them. It’s like they melt into the darkness, and even Hal can’t seem to find them again despite shooting a beam out of the ring.

“Damn!” He kicks at the ground. “What the hell was that all about?”

Dinah catches Ollie still staring and gives him a slow smirk. “You never date a Gotham girl before, Mr. Queen?”

“No, but I’m starting to think I ought to.” Ollie half-whistles, taking the bottle from her.

“If you two could quit flirting for five minutes and process that _the Batman_ literally just threatened us?” Hal scowls.

“Oh, suck it up, you big baby. He’s like an insecure child asking you not to play in his sandbox, I know you’re touchy about being told what not to do, but it seriously ain’t worth it this time.” Ollie risks a step closer, and places both his hands on Hal’s shoulders, affectionately yanking him backward. “’Sides, now that Big Blue’s on your team, it’s only a matter of time before he joins, too. They’re chummy.”

“How do you know?”

“Teamed with both of them before.”

Hal turns and shoots him a baffled look. “You know, you’re weirdly well-connected for someone who doesn’t want anything to do with the larger superhero community.”

“One-offs don’t count. I’m not about to start taking oaths and wearing matching uniforms – and they’re not my _friends_. You are.”

Mollified, Hal relents with a grudging smile. “The day that guy joins is the day I seriously hand in my notice, though.”

“Tell me about it. Imagine ever being corrected by that smug-faced asshole,” Dinah grumbles. “He almost makes _you_ seem tolerable, Jordan.”

For once Hal doesn’t even take the bait, instead putting on an exaggerated growl. “ _I’m Batman. Gotham City is under my protection. That, of course, means I literally own it. I now banish you plebeians once and for all._ ”

Dinah seems to surprise herself with her own laugh. “Oh, that’s uncanny!”

Hal chuckles, pleased, and he looks like he doesn’t know how to feel about that either.

Smiling to himself, Ollie throws his arms around both of their shoulders, pulling them close. “ _I’m Batman. I’m now dragging a non-meta kid out fighting crime with me and absolutely nobody is questioning this. Except for the brilliant, compassionate, and utterly handsome Green Arrow._ ”

“More like sanctimonious and full of himself.” Dinah snorts.

“Gross, you’re implying _he_ thinks you’re handsome.” Hal chokes on a barking laugh.

“…You know, I think I like it better when you two were sassing _each other_.”

“Suck it up, you big baby,” Hal and Dinah both quote back at him at the same time, then catch each other’s eyes and burst into helpless laughter. Ollie can’t help but join in.

(The night goes on, suddenly warmer than before. They give up looking for their teammates, retire to Dinah’s apartment for what remains of it.)

(And then there were three. Just like that.)


	2. Act II

**Him. 1991.**

Sometimes, Hal wonders if maybe they’re getting too old to be having epiphanies of this kind, him and Ollie. But then he realises it may have only been a eureka moment for _him_. Ollie – he has never set much store by the rules and norms and it occurs to Hal, all of a sudden, that he may well have known men like that – heck, may well have _known_ men like that – in his time, that oft-eulogised freer time, in which case all this isn’t Hal’s fault, so much as society’s. _You’re learning_ , he can almost hear Ollie say, in response to that, despite the fact that the man in question is in actuality asleep in the back of the truck. It isn’t his fault he had been told epiphanies of this kind come after sordid, clandestine hook-ups with men you never learn the names of in the morning – because surely _men_ don’t do that – not in a crappy truck on a crappy highway after randomly realising you can’t quite picture what life had been like before meeting the inconsiderate asshole snoring the dead awake out back.

There has never been so much as a kiss.

Hal thinks back to that first year of knowing him, to when Ollie had been doing his damnedest to keep Hal at a certain, inexplicable distance. The fights he’d picked, for absolutely no reason, the barbs and insults, all to prove that he was fine on his own – didn’t need Hal – all having the opposite effect of convincing Hal he was _very much not_ , and _did_. It had been a case of one stubborn disposition meeting another, and it had to end with either giving way. At last what had looked to most everyone else like a year-long rivalry (though it had really been, make no mistake, a very, very strange courting) ended with Ollie hoisting that metaphorical white flag: by randomly showing up at Hal’s apartment, two whole cities away, to make breakfast.

Because that’s the kind of relationship this is. Skip the sex and straight to breakfast.

Hal sighs. It’s how he’d come by his epiphany, really, when he and Ollie had been passing through a quaint little town a little ways outside Missouri (where people still said _Missouri_ like _Missoura_ ) and had stopped for a bite to eat. The cheerful hotel receptionist had asked about the picture in Ollie’s wallet, when he had been about to pay, and he and Hal hadn’t been able to help talking at length about Roy. The young lady had gone red as a beetroot and a little giggly-giddy and eventually she’d said, “He’s lucky to have such doting fathers.”

And Hal doesn’t think of Roy as his kid any more (or any less) than he does Wally – or Jason and Helen and Jane and Howard – but the remark, nevertheless, makes him ponder all the ways in which his and Ollie’s relationship is, well, _a relationship_ , short only of the physicality.

That had been the only thing keeping him from seeing it really, he thinks. The lack of physicality. It’s generally the only frame of reference one gets for when a friendship has crossed over into not-a-friendship-anymore, and without it, Hal had needed a crappy truck and a crappy highway and a giggly small-town girl. But he knows it now, anyway, so he asks someone for a dangerous favour. Now he’s only staring up at the stars, waiting for one to fly down and bring him his request.

It’s gone past midnight when it arrives. Lucky for him Ollie prefers open space to motels and that the weather’s so nice, or he never would have been able to stopover in a field in the middle of nowhere so Appa can come and go without being seen. Before the flash of green light can materialise into a small, humanoid form even, Hal straightens off of the driver’s-seat door which he’d been leaning against in anticipation. “You have it?” he questions. Appa takes his time levitating close, which is a little nerve-wracking.

“I have it,” he confirms lowly, “But I have to impress upon you how _much_ of a violation this is, Hal Jordan of Earth. If I did not know you to be one who would not use it for his own ambition—”

“I know,” Hal cuts in, trying to sound as solemn as he can, and not give away his impatience. “I swear I wouldn’t have asked if it weren’t vital. You know him.”

“…Alas, I do,” Appa concedes. Then, with a close approximation of a smile: “And perhaps you have helped me understand Earthling emotion well enough to… see, and… appreciate, the need.”

He presents Hal his delivery.

“Thank you. I owe you.”

“You do not, Mr. Jordan. It is payment for helping me face trial on Oa,” the ex-guardian says. “Well, then. Until we meet again.”

Hal waves at the comet-like green light lifting into the night sky, until it’s no more than a distant, glowing speck.

Ollie wakes a little after sunrise. “You wanna catch some shut-eye too? I can drive,” is the first thing he says, looking over the tailgate. Hal turns around from heating up the bean-cans over the fire, sends him an amused grin.

“Good morning to you too. Come on, we can switch after eating.”

He waits until they’re about two-thirds of the way to finished, interrupts Ollie on a rant about littering.

“I know we’re still about a thousand miles from Cali, but I get the sense we won’t be stopping for any more adventures on the way.”

Ollie wipes bean-juice off of his lips with the back of his hand and nods. “Yeah, I’d say so. I’m kind of aching for home. And Dinah. Aren’t you?”

Hal shrugs, pokes at the fire. “So this is the last leg of our Great American Road Trip.”

“You say that like I’ll never see you again, Jordan. Wasn’t it you who used to pronounce us _practically neighbours_?”

He chuckles, obliging. “Sue me for getting a little sentimental. It’s not gonna be just you, me, and the open road anymore, though. There’s the League and solo missions and work and family…”

“Never stopped us before,” Ollie points out, confused.

“No. But I guess I ought to tell you the kind of thing I can only tell you in private, before this ends.”

Ollie frowns. “What do you mean?”

Hal glances up, and meets his eyes. Caught off-guard, Ollie’s instinctively flick away, then return, hesitant and half-worried. “I’m not always gonna be around, to protect you. I don’t know if we really did find America out there, but I do know I found something. The realisation that I really, _really_ wish I _could_ always be here. To make sure you’re… safe, and… happy, and… alive.”

“Hal, I don’t do double meanings on the best of days. What are you saying?”

Hal reaches into his pocket and pulls it out. With his other hand, he takes one of Ollie’s, ignoring the way that it freezes up in his hold. He places the ring on Ollie’s palm, curls his fingers to close over it snug and tight. “It’s a spare I got Appa to bring me. If you’re ever in trouble and I can’t help – use it.”

There’s near-reverential silence for a solid minute, as Ollie uncurls, stares, and then clasps around it again as if it were breakable. “I… get that it’s a weapon, but… Hal, you’re giving me a ring.”

Hal nods, his eyes contemplative. “I am.”

“…Okay.” Ollie sucks in a breath. Pockets it. “Okay. Then I guess I ought to tell you something, too. I don’t know if I _should_ say it, but I don’t want you to just— go on, without knowing it, so—”

“You don’t need to say it, Ollie.” Hal sends him a sad smile. “I hear you. I hear you all the time.”

Ollie’s head turns to the side sharply, and he’s blinking a lot. “And you, you—?”

“Yeah.”

“Just making sure.”

“Yeah.”

“Guess we’re a little late, though. …A lot late.”

“What for?” Hal stands, dusts off his jeans. “We _have_ a life together. If this trip’s taught me anything, it’s that some things aren’t straightforward. And they don’t need to be.” He stretches one hand out to help Ollie up, lets it linger for a second after Ollie’s on his feet. “So now let’s… get you home to Dinah and Roy.”

Ollie’s gaze is just as bittersweet. “And give Carol my best.”

“Not unless you want her to die from the shock.” Hal breathes a silent laugh.

“Hal.”

He turns, watches Ollie shoving both hands into his pockets, kicking the grass to avoid looking at him.

“Something else I don’t say, but ought to? You’re my dearest friend, and I’m glad we met.”

“Me too,” Hal whispers it like a secret.

Ollie smiles tightly, then with one curt nod steps forward toward the truck. “And don’t be a stranger when we get back.”

“I know you well enough to know I’ll _have_ to be, for the first couple weeks you’re gonna want to yourself after so much time in close quarters with another human person.” Hal chuckles. “After that, count on it. You’re not getting rid of me that easy.”

* * *

**Him. ~~19—?~~ ∞**

The fog clears for the first time in weeks, whatever _weeks_ even mean now. Hal isn’t sure whether Ollie notices the glowing gold in his eyes receding, the brown returning wide and horrified, but if he does, it no longer matters. There’s that wolf’s-stare in Ollie’s that has been there since he killed the man who’d taken Dinah, and Hal knows all too well that it sees no room for mercy.

Still, he thinks – hopes – he isn’t imagining the moment’s hesitation when Kyle shouts, “Arrow, not this way! The fight totally drained him, he’s—!”

But Ollie lets the arrow loose, and, as always, it flies true, finding its mark with ease. Hal feels stabbing pain through his heart twice over. Rasps, “Oliver…”

And then – nothing.

* * *

**Her. 1992.**

Carol often asks her – woman to woman, lover to lover – if she ever questions it, too. Dinah tends to say no, which she knows Carol takes to mean that she has nothing to worry about, though what Dinah’s really trying to say is she doesn’t question it because she doesn’t see the point.

It’s a fact, plain to see, and she supposes the only reason she doesn’t mind it despite her jealous nature is, one, because Hal _had_ known him first, and two, because it doesn’t seem to be about what he can give Ollie that she can’t, doesn’t seem to be about her _lacking_. If anything she suspects she offers something indispensable to them both: her womanhood. Sure, Hal and Ollie may look at one another a certain way, but aside from the occasional hug and handshake they’re still awkward about touch, as if it would burn them. Dinah, on the other hand, gets to have that and have it in plenty with Ollie, now that they’re official.

If anything, it’s Hal she ought to feel sorry for.

It’s because it’s _Hal_ , though. She has no objection to Hal-and-Ollie, it’s because it’s _him_ , because they still have unfinished business with _each other_ that they refuse to acknowledge to this day. She stares at the telephone, willing herself to swallow her pride and pick it up, dial his number. What a sorry excuse of a girlfriend he’d think her… no, he’s always thought Ollie could do better, hasn’t he? She isn’t sure she can take that, not from him, but then what other choice does she have?

She stretches a hand out across the sheets she’s sitting on, remembering the last time she had slept over here.

_I love your chest._

_Mm._

_It’s solid. Strong._

_Mm-hmm?_

_And your hands. They don’t look it, but you have such careful hands._

_Anything you love that_ isn’t _to do with my body? I’m starting to feel all objectified here, Pretty Bird._

_You’re my rock, Ollie._

_…Di…_

_Sometimes it feels like a storm. In here. But you handle it. Like it’s nothing._

_…You aren’t as difficult as you think you are, you know._

_Yes, I am. You haven’t seen the worst of me yet._

_Then bring it, kid. I’m still not going anywhere._

Liar. Her hand balls into a fist and she has to resist the urge to scream the walls down. What choice does she have? She grabs the receiver and jams the digits in, blinking away the blurriness in her vision. Hal picks up on the third ring. “Hello?”

“…It’s Ollie.” She can’t help saying it straight away, doesn’t think she could bear exchanging hollow greetings and small talk first. “I hadn’t heard from him all weekend and I just assumed it was a mission, but then two more days and _nothing_ , and he wouldn’t pick up the phone so I came to his apartment myself and—”

“Dinah, breathe.” But Hal’s voice is suddenly all alert and business-like, too. “I can be there in an hour, just tell me what’s wrong.”

“He’s gone, Hal. He’s just _gone_.” Her voice breaks. “The place was in a mess. I found his uniform in shreds, his arrows— snapped, his favourite bow is broken— the Howard Hill one.”

“That’s not like him.” Hal sounds worried. “Any clue who might have—?”

“That’s just it.” Dinah bites her lip to hold back a helpless, grieving cry. “There’s no sign of a break-in or a scuffle. The locks are all in place, the furniture’s not damaged. I don’t think he’s been taken, Hal, I think he _left_.”

Silence, on the other end, for the span of a heartbeat. Then Hal says, “I’m on my way.”

She’s all suited up, by the time he gets there. She hadn’t meant to make a scene, but she’d been steeling herself for you-should-have’s and how-could-you’s, and when all Hal gives her instead is a pitying look and a whisper of, “Dinah…” – she can’t help breaking down in his arms. Hal lets her, until with gritted teeth she forcefully pulls herself together and they both go out to question the people in and around the nearest streets.

“Yeah, I saw Green Arrow. Shot a man straight off that balcony there. Don’t think he meant to,” says the wide-eyed woman they’d found leaning against a lamppost in front of an alley. “It was my night, so I said to him he done all of us a favour, that sleaze was bad business and every girl working these parts knows it. But he wouldn’t listen. Shocked to have killed somebody, I think. Ain’t seen him since, though.”

“It’s that injury,” Dinah realises, horrified. “It must have been. His arm never healed right after that crossbow hit, he must have slipped, and missed and— accidentally killed a man— if the guilt of it made him feel like he needed to take responsibility, Hal, you _know_ him, he—”

“Easy,” he shushes her in a careful tone. Sort of like when Ollie is trying to gentle one of his more reckless horses, which only makes her feel violent. “Let’s go back to his place, piece together the evidence. We’ll find him, Di.”

“You don’t get it!” She whips around, enraged, shaking his hand off of her shoulder. “The _evidence_ points to Ollie— going off on his own to cope with this, or whatever the hell, and he didn’t tell me _or_ you, he just—”

“Left us,” Hal finishes for her in a quiet voice. “I do. Get it. Di, I’m the only other person who _would_ , so please.”

And all the fight drains out of her, just like that. She brings both arms up to wrap around herself. “…How could he, Hal…?”

“I think with everything that happened with Roy, and then Isaac, and then this… it was just one person after the other that he couldn’t save,” Hal tells his shoes. “We know what that feels like – how _much_ it hurts. And Ollie… he’s not used to turning to anybody else for help, let alone for comfort. You buy into that when you buy into _him_ , Dinah. That’s just how it works.”

“And you’re just _okay_ with that?”

“Never said I was,” Hal answers, low and almost bitter.

There really is no point in taking this out on him, Dinah decides, as she turns to the side sharply so she doesn’t have to acknowledge the grief in his eyes that mirrors her own. “I hate him.”

“No.” Hal releases a humourless breath. “You love him. That’s what makes it worse.” He arches off of the wall he had been leaning against, brings a tentative arm up to her shoulder. “Come on – get some rest. You never know, he might come back, and you’d be there waiting. I’ll find myself a hotel close by too, so…”

For the first time, Dinah understands. This is one heartache she will never have to bear alone.

* * *

All she registers at first is the warmth. It’s not the warmth of skin on skin, but it feels as full of care and affection as that would, which makes her push past the dizziness to open her eyes and see for herself. Ollie’s face looks back at her, full of love, and her heart soars – that alone startling her conscious again. But then she realises that the face isn’t life-sized, and the arms holding her aren’t opaque or coloured anything like human flesh. It’s a construct. Hal’s. Of course it is. No one else aside from her would know every nuance of Ollie’s face back to front like this.

A couple of metres away, Hal’s chasing down the group of white supremacists she’d been trying to infiltrate earlier, and it all comes back to her – how they’d caught her, knocked her out, even attempted to throw her unconscious body into the river. The Ollie construct had caught her before she dropped, and is now placing her gently back onto her feet on the sidewalk. Hal has most of her attackers hung by the backs of their collars on constructed meat-hooks – poetic justice, she assumes – as she looks on, feeling detached again now she knows Ollie isn’t really there.

“You okay, kid?” He flies down to her the second they have all been caught, holding one hand out for support as the Ollie construct lets go of her waist.

Dinah takes it, nodding slowly. “Apart from a headache, yes. Thanks for the rescue.”

“You weren’t at the apartment, so I thought I’d look—”

“I’m lucky you did.”

“—I was more hoping for an explanation than your gratitude, Di.”

She turns away, brooding.

Hal sighs. “Dinah, I’m not only staying here because I’m waiting for Ollie to show, too. You can ask me for help, you know. These fights you’ve been picking lately, they’re— I’m not saying they aren’t important, but they’re reckless, and— look, you being in danger isn’t gonna bring him back, it won’t help either of you.”

“I don’t know what else to _do_ , okay?” she returns, desperation in her voice. “I need to be occupied or I’ll go _insane_ just waiting. It’s his place – it smells like him. Feels like him. I— I can’t.”

“Well, if you move into the hotel with me—”

“Oh, I’ll just bet Carol wouldn’t mind that at all.”

“It wouldn’t _be_ like that.”

“It doesn’t matter what it’s like, it matters what _she’ll_ think it’s like.” Dinah sighs. “She’s my friend, too, Hal.”

He makes a frustrated sound. “Fine, then— I can stake out his place and you can move into the hotel.”

“Like hell. I’m still his girlfriend.” It comes out like both a reminder and warning.

He glares right back. “You might have the monopoly on that, but not on who else is allowed to give a shit. About either of you.”

She can’t find the right words quick enough, and by then the tension has passed, Hal’s back to pitying her. “Go home, Dinah,” he coaxes. “Another trail will turn up soon enough.”

“I ought to,” she grits out. “I ought to _really_ go home, back to Gotham. I bet if I packed my bags and left right this minute, no one would _but_ you would ever hold it against me. Ollie’s— he’s so used to being all on his own, he’s become the _best_ at it. I don’t think he even knows how to need me like I need him. Or he wouldn’t have… have…”

“So why don’t you?” Hal asks softly.

Dinah’s eyes fill with tears, her nails digging into her palms as her hands ball into fists. “…Two. Months. Hal. We’re crazy to still be waiting. We are, we’re crazy. What if he’s dead?”

“I’d know if he was,” Hal answers with bitter conviction. “I know I would.”

“If he won’t come back for you, no way is he coming back for me.”

“You haven’t been paying attention, if you seriously think that.” Hal exhales. “And yet somehow, it makes me feel sorrier for you than him. That you still don’t see it.”

“Don’t patronise me.”

“You’re right, you know.” He swallows. “Ollie doesn’t tell me much about his childhood, but it doesn’t take a genius to piece together that he never had a wealth of friendship. Still doesn’t. It will only be a matter of… getting used to a new normal. And he’d do it for you – believe me.”

“If he doesn’t?” There’s a plea in her whisper, but Dinah doesn’t feel like hiding it. “If this is it, he’s gone forever?”

“Are you leaving?” Hal challenges.

She holds his gaze, then twists away, glassy-eyed, frustrated beyond belief. “Love has to be some type of madness.” After a moment’s pause, “Why don’t _you_ go home? Two months is quite a while to keep Carol up nights waiting for you to get back, too.”

Hal’s half-a-smile in answer is rueful. “ _Folie à deux?_ ”

She laughs, she can’t help herself, incredulous at first, and then eventually all but hysterical. “What are we doing? What the _hell_ are we doing?”

Shaking his head, Hal wraps his arms around her in a tight embrace, letting her calm her breathing to his own heartbeat. “I also… don’t like the idea of leaving you alone, with all this.”

Dinah looks up, touched. It’s a dangerous moment, her with her still-glistening eyes and him looking on with so much sympathy, and the vulnerability, the loneliness of the whole situation. She’s not sure when she notices his gaze drop to her lips, or when she gives in to the urge to tilt her head back ever-so-slightly.

“We shouldn’t,” Hal whispers.

“…Did we want to?” she whispers back.

He doesn’t answer, but somehow, it’s answer enough.

* * *

**Her. 1997.**

Roy’s standing at her door, ashen-faced and older than the last time she’d seen him. “It’s complicated,” he clarifies, “I _think_ he died, like, I have very real memories of him dying in the— other place, but then this whole… second Big Bang thing happened, and I’m not sure that’s still part of the new reality. Whatever it is, he’s gone, though, and definitely not, you know, actively able to destroy the universe and all… anymore. I wasn’t sure if anyone else would have remembered to tell you, so I figured… well. Yeah.”

Dinah doesn’t have the heart to tell him that the ones on the frontlines aren’t the only ones who had felt the universes expanding, colliding into one another. That she knows, has been forced to relive the good times (Hal joking, “Well, loving somebody with as much baggage as Oliver Queen qualifies as unpaid labour. Me and you are only unionising.”), the bad times (she’d yelled in a fit of helpless jealousy, “He says he doesn’t need to be anybody else with you— that you’ll have him as he is, you’ll never want him to change—”, and Hal had countered, “But the fact that he _isn’t_ going to leave you, even when you ask him to—”), and all the times in between (“Bring him back, Hal,” heart aching as she waits for news that Ollie did survive the crash, “Bring him back, Hal,” heart aching as she watches him fall into the drinking again, “Bring him back, Hal,” because she can’t ever seem to do it herself) over and over and over again.

“Thank you.” It comes out hoarser than she would have liked it to, and she’s suddenly hyperaware of how she must look like some mourning widow, standing there less than put together, arms wrapped around herself for comfort. She forces them down to her sides. “Come in, you must be—”

“Oh, no, I gotta get back to the team.” Roy shoots her a tight smile. “Dick left the Titans to me while he’s off honeymooning. You gonna be okay, though? I can ask if—”

“I’m alright, Roy.” Equally strained smile back. “Thanks again.”

“No problem.” He hesitates. “You’ll call, if you need anything? I still think of you as family, you know, even if you and Ollie…”

And there, all of a sudden, is the same fucking elephant that always barges into their room, one that never did learn how to be subtle. She turns. “…How is he?”

She’s ruminating about what an ironic question that is to ask Roy, given the two of them in particular aren’t supposed to care anymore, but when he takes a moment longer to answer her eyes slide back to meet his and she’s shocked by the emotion suddenly shining in them. “He did it,” Roy mumbles.

“Did what?” Dinah prompts, confused.

“Stopped Hal.” He worries at a corner of his bottom lip. “That is, I mean… killed… Hal.”

It takes a minute to sink in, and even then, she’s certain she heard wrong. “What?”

Roy nods. “Batgirl got in Hal— in Parallax’s way, when he was trying to hurt Grant— Damage. Friend of mine, only a kid. And— I think that’s when Ollie realised he was too far gone to save. So he…”

Dinah’s aware that she’s staring, but she can’t bring herself to tear her eyes away, as if she’s half-expecting Roy to crack a grin and yell _sike_. But he doesn’t. She blinks rapidly at the floor, as her heart races. “But then— is he—?”

“Clark tried to talk to him, after, but he brushed everybody off and went to…” Roy trails away, swallowing visibly. “He’s still breathing, if that’s what you mean.”

The unspoken _for now_ hangs in the air, thick and ominous.

“…Di?”

She looks up, and wonders if her anxiety is that plain to see, too.

“I don’t mean to say it like you weren’t more important, but— I don’t think anyone knows Ollie like I do, and— well, he never had anybody before Hal. That’s a fact.” There’s a pained quality to his face and his voice. “What I’m trying to— and it’s not to be cruel or anything, it’s just— I really wouldn’t be surprised if I had to turn up here again, to tell you about another passing. Is all.”

It’s true, she realises. Try as she might, she can’t picture a single scenario where Ollie _wouldn’t_ follow Hal to the grave. Her grief, at that moment, extends to both her and the boy— the young man— standing in front of her, the ones he loved enough to kill and die for, but never enough to stick around for. And this miserable understanding passes between them: if they couldn’t make him stay then, they can’t make him stay now. There’s no point trying.

Anyway, they aren’t supposed to care anymore.

Roy starts to leave. “I’m sorry for your loss, Dinah. Seriously, call me whenever you want company.”

“It’s your loss too, isn’t it.” A statement, not a question, and the smile she gives him is both wretched and understanding.

“I don’t think I’m ready to claim that yet.” He sends her a rueful one back. “But here’s to those two fucking off somewhere and leaving us in the dust again, eh.”

“…The last time, I followed,” Dinah half-whispers, almost to herself.

“Goodnight,” Roy answers just as softly.

* * *

**Him. The Before-Time.**

How does he even begin to describe what Hal Jordan means? (Used to mean. Shut up.) He read a Forster novel once, a gay thing, where this one guy said to the other one, “I should have gone through life half awake if you’d had the decency to leave me alone,” or something to that effect, and that’s kind of what this is – at the heart of it – Hal Jordan, the persistence he never asked for in spite of (himself—) his best attempts at shaking him off, when meeting for one coffee had turned into an office visit and then a house visit and then a mission and then too many…

Hal Jordan means whatever the opposite of _alone_ is, but that’s for better _and_ for worse. “Why do you keep coming around?” Ollie had flat out asked, in the beginning (because he’s never been above bluntness, never set much store by the convoluted rules of _socially acceptable_ and _manners_ and whatnot), and Hal had only looked confused.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

 _Because people don’t like me!_ Ollie had wanted to yell, Jesus Christ, Hal has never been the brightest crayon in the box but surely as beloved a hero as he is he should have inferred _that_ much, but all he’d done after that was keep showing up at his place or as back-up on his missions and really, who could blame Ollie for deciding the Arrowplane and Arrowcar needed new paint-jobs.

(“…Oh, come _on_ ,” Hal had said on a shocked and half-despairing exhale when Ollie had first driven past in all that bright yellow and smugly waved.)

Not even that had been a deterrent though, which in hindsight and to-be-fair Ollie should have figured, whenever Hal feels pressured to do something he’s more likely to turn around and do the exact opposite out of spite (kindred spirits), but Ollie never backs down from a challenge either and an incredibly awkward friendship-rivalry had made itself comfortable between them for well, quite a while after.

“Hey, what exactly is the deal with your friend?” He had caved and asked Barry, once, close to breaking point.

Startled, Barry had looked up from where he’d been attempting to fix one of the generators on Mount Justice. “…Are you talking to me?”

“No, the _other_ cop-bootlicker in tight red spandex.” (Said dryly.)

Barry had bristled, and God, Ollie had wanted to go back out to the meeting room right then and drag Hal along and point and say, “See! Look! _That’s_ normal!”, but then Barry had bitten out, “I think you’ll need to be more specific than that.”

“You know. Jordan. Don’t you two go way back or whatever?” Ollie had clarified, frowning in contemplation. “He keeps asking me to join your little superhero club.”

“Well, hurray for you,” Barry had snapped. “Doesn’t sound that complicated to me. Yes or no.”

“I don’t wanna be on the JLA.”

“And that’s _great_ news, Ollie, ’cause nobody _but_ Hal wants you on the JLA.”

Ollie had frowned some more. But then, why would Hal insist, if that was the case? Seems like he’d save himself a lot of grief, if he’d just quit trying to wingman Ollie to a team he doesn’t care to be on, they all adore him and Ollie’s not skilled enough to be _invaluable_ , to warrant jeopardising his— but he must have taken too long mulling it over because then he’d glanced up again and Barry had seemed vaguely embarrassed.

“What?”

“That, um, came out wrong. Sorry. I only mean, you’re, you know…”

“Caustic, inconsiderate, clearly not a team player?”

Barry had gone the colour of his suit. “I never said any of that.”

Confused look. “But that’s what you meant.”

“No— not like _that_ —”

“So you _do_ want me on the League?”

“Well, I guess it’s not for me to decide, really—”

“So you don’t want me on the League.”

“Ollie—”

“You _sound_ frustrated,” Ollie had pointed out, puzzled. “Why are you trying to deny it? You don’t want me to join because you don’t like me, it’s not that complicated.”

“What I’m _trying_ to do is spare your feelings.” Through gritted teeth, beyond vexed. “There’s— less spiteful ways I could have worded that.”

“…Why would you think that I care enough about your opinion of me that you could hurt my feelings?”

It had been a genuine question – come on, _Barry Allen_ , really, he’s, like, bottom rung on the pecking order, when it comes to people Ollie could ever feel chastised by – but Barry had looked at him like he’d said he was going to murder Iris, or something, and then dropped his wrench on the work-table and stormed out of the room. Cue curtain.

That’s people, though. That’s what people are like. There’s rules to conversation and rules to facial expression and rules to when it is and isn’t appropriate to bring up politics and, well, it’s Ollie. He doesn’t like to follow rules. Sure, he can pretend if he tries hard enough, and he sometimes does, but _pretending_ implies imposition on the natural state, you know – implies _effort_ ’cause it’s not one’s default. And Ollie doesn’t see the point in _making_ that effort all the time – sure, people get offended the second he drops the act, but who needs people, anyway – so he plain refuses to. Which is when he gets the Barry Allens storming out of the room.

So why— the _fuck_ — is Hal Jordan still sharing a sandwich with him high above the city on patrol?

“—Also need a little empathy. To refugees like my grandparents, for instance, this country _did_ mean freedom and safety.”

“But that only makes it doubly insidious when the government tries to take advantage of…” Ollie trails off, on the brink of an epiphany, apropos of nothing.

“Advantage of what?” Hal prompts.

“You know,” Ollie blurts out, “I never feel exhausted talking to you.”

Hal sends him a quizzical look. “Thanks?”

That’s it, Ollie realises. He gets to drop the act, with Hal, and even though Hal never takes anything lying down he doesn’t seem to mind it enough to burden Ollie with _demands_ , either. Ollie gets to flout the rules, so to speak, and if Hal doesn’t mind it, then— well, then, there’s no need to keep Hal out of his life for his own quietude after all.

Hal Jordan means…

There’s a blizzard outside, and the door bursts open and Hal’s shaking and shivering but grinning wide. “It’s wild out there.” And Ollie is gawking in horrified silence but he manages, “Tell me you didn’t drive down to Star in that crappy truck of yours _during a blizzard_.” – and Hal had only laughed, and Dinah had emerged from the kitchen with a delighted smile, and, “You made it! Happy New Year’s!” – “Eve,” Hal corrects, hugs her and kisses her cheek, “Huh-hey, Bird Lady, good to see ya…” – Ollie exhales. “You know you can _fly_ , right?”

There’s a pleasant chill in the air and the stars are a brilliant canvas of twinkling lights, and a flash of green like a comet’s-tail joins them as Ollie looks on from the porch. It circles down, down, down, until it materialises into a person, brown curls and brown eyes and a quiet smile too, kind of smile that doesn’t want to make a big deal about itself. Ollie thinks of some absurd metaphor about shooting stars. Gets annoyed at himself for it. “You know you can _drive_ , right?” he grumbles.

(If you ask Ollie, pretty boys ought to come with some kind of warning label.)

* * *

**Him. The Aftermath.**

In one universe, he dies. In one universe, he doesn’t. In one universe Bats shows up at his city and says, “We need you.” In one universe he lets the arrow fly.

It hits Hal. It doesn’t hit Hal. Both times Ollie still knows what letting go of that bowstring had felt like. Once, it goes right through Hal’s heart, though it feels more like it’d gone through his own. Once, Hal just disappears, and he’s not sure which had been easier to stomach.

Ollie doesn’t really know what grief is supposed to feel like. When his parents died he’d worn black and flung dust onto the wooden coffins but the only thing running through his mind had been, _Mama would hate the lettering on her headstone. Should ask them for prettier after this_. He’d probably come a lot closer to something like it the day Dinah had said, “Pack your things and go,” but that had been something more akin to panic, and it’s not panic he’s feeling at the moment.

What he’s feeling is more like the cold that forewarns Seattle rain, the kind of cold that seeps into your skin and leaves you weirdly melancholic even when you warm up. One of his nannies, as a kid, had read him the story about the Snow Queen – frozen shards piercing through your heart. Like that.

“Oliver…?” Clark tries.

“I don’t think he’s up ta talking, Big Blue,” Guy interrupts, uncharacteristically solemn.

The portal takes them back outside of the timestream. Damage runs for the other Titans. Roy looks relieved, catches him in a quick embrace. Everyone fills each other in on what happened…

Ollie feels like he’s watching all of this still suspended in hyperspace.

He registers that Diana and Power Girl are talking about a baby— what baby— oh, there’s a baby in Power Girl’s arms. Life for a life. “I went into labour in the midst of a crisis, and by the time it was over, I had given birth to this beautiful baby boy. This is the ultimate victory – life! We should feel great!”

He has to fight down borderline-hysterical laughter. “Right.”

They all turn at his voice, startled. He feels violent, all of a sudden. Wishes they were all dead. That ugly fucking baby, too. What is _wrong_ with her. Hal’s—

He can’t stay, or he’ll do something stupid. He brushes past them all, and as if they can sense the intensity of his anger they part, make way, like _he’s_ the one that needs the funeral flank. It’s odd, it’s— cold in his chest but at the same time it feels like a dam is pushing against his heart, about to burst through his eyes. He’s not sure where to go, ends up by the monument.

The last time his hands had been shaking this badly, he’d been tortured for a full forty-eight hours. Dinah had been there. Dinah had been there to cry over him— put a gun to his attackers and then to their own heads, because that’s how they used to want to leave this world—

Together.

He doesn’t mean to scream.

* * *

**Them. 1997.**

“—Jesus Christ, I’m jumpier than Ralph that time he got stuck in an elevator with old Spooky.” Ollie tries to force one pair of cufflinks closed with trembling fingers. Nervousness is incongruent, on him. Hal is laughing under his breath as he helps him straighten his bowtie again.

“Would you calm down? It’s just Dinah.”

“My soon-to-be wife isn’t _just_ anything, thank you.” Ollie snorts. “It’s a miracle she even said yes, after everything.”

Hal arches an eyebrow, though he can’t quit smiling. “You mean it’s a _Hal Jordan_ she said yes, and you’re welcome, by the way. Ungrateful bastard.”

“Same difference.” Ollie’s grin mellows into something as intimate as a secret. Used to be that moments like this, when the atmosphere feels suddenly charged, blindsided Hal― blindsided them both. But now it’s as mundane as the sunrise, now it belongs. Has never not.

Hal’s hands deliberately slow down, so they can linger on Ollie’s chest. “Someone smart said something about how there’s different kinds of love. So I guess it stands to reason there’s different kinds of _lovers_ , too. I might not be the one exchanging vows with you today, Ollie, but…”

Ollie’s hands close around his, so careful and gradual it feels like he’s trying to savour it, and then Ollie’s face is really close, and then— softness against his lips, there and gone again. “Doesn’t have to be straightforward. Right?”

Hal smiles. “Right.”

“I thought I’d find Hal in here with you.”

They both turn around to where Dinah has just burst into the room, half-dressed but already looking like a dream.

“Di!” Ollie all but splutters, turning away. “It’s bad luck to see ya before—”

“Oh, bullshit, how much bad luck have we _already_ overcome? I say, bring it.” She laughs. Then she rushes at Hal, who catches her in an instinctive embrace, startled, and beams up at him with so much joy he’d be lying if he didn’t admit it gets him all choked up. “I’m probably not gonna get the chance to talk to you in private, later, with that horde out there, so I just wanted to thank you now.”

Hal chuckles. “What for?”

“Don’t play dumb.” Dinah steps back and turns to Ollie with the sweetest of smiles, taking his hand in hers while he looks on like he can’t quite believe that someone like her even exists. “If you hadn’t talked me out of leaving Ollie for good… hadn’t convinced me that he really does love me…”

“No offence, Ollie, but what I was actually trying to do was convince _her_ that she’s worth loving.” Hal squeezes the hand still in his, full of pride and affection. “Di, you look like a million bucks. I would be jealous if you weren’t about to prove you have really terrible taste.”

“Hey!”

They both laugh as Ollie colours. “I’m kidding. I can’t think of two people who deserve each other more,” Hal says, smiling softly. “Dinah – it’s not about what you can or can’t do. He just wants _you_ , hon. _You_ are more than enough. And Ollie…” – glistening eyes meeting glistening eyes – “…Sometimes compromise is worth it. Sometimes you fight to _keep_ , not just not to lose.”

He lets go of Dinah’s hand, steps forward to wrap his arms around Ollie’s shoulders. Whispers in his ear, “And whenever you don’t feel like fighting… well, I’m not going anywhere.”

Ollie’s hand tightens once over a fistful of his coat. He pulls away, clears his throat, his grin carefree again. “That was much better than the best man speech you wrote up, just so you know.”

“Asshole.”

“It’s funny, we’re the ones getting married, but this relationship really does miss something vital without you,” Dinah observes, chuckles behind a dainty, gloved hand.

—No. No, no, no, all wrong. She would never say that. Golden eyes blink and blink again as Hal scrambles to think up something better, the other consciousness on top of his waiting, waiting. It doesn’t matter anymore. The Dinah and Ollie standing in front of him have stood there suspended for a second too long for this scene to be believably real. Frustrated, Hal drops the illusion.

The happy newlyweds dissolve into thin air, and all he’s left with is an empty desert and Ollie’s voice echoing, “Get out of my life, Hal Jordan, while I’m still sorry I killed you.”

He drops his head into his hands.


	3. Act III

**Her. 1998.**

Neither Connor nor Roy show up to the funeral. It’s getting even, in their minds, and Dinah understands that – the crowd here is a complete insult to the handful that had been present at Ollie’s wake, meaning Hal, even after all that he’d done, is being shown the respect that a dead hero deserves, the respect that Ollie had been denied despite never having wavered from _his_ code.

But the boys don’t understand something, too. Not just that Hal and Ollie wouldn’t have appreciated being pitted against each other like that, but also that no one here – aside from maybe Carol and Tom and the human Lanterns and herself – is actually present to mourn _Hal_. Not really. Not Hal as he was, alive and flawed and human, hero and soldier and brother and son. Only Hal, the way they remember him. Damned and then martyred and then celebrated as something… not quite mortal.

This isn’t even the actual funeral – Jack had overseen a private levaya that none of them had been invited to. It’s only for the benefit of those he left behind. A memorial, really, a platitude.

Just the fact that Bruce is in attendance at all, to spit on Hal’s memory by staying apart from the rest of them up on the balcony with his kids – symbolically making it clear where they all stand – is proof enough of that.

Seated where she is just beneath them, she can hear echoes of Bruce’s muttering clearly. “I find it difficult to accept his actions no matter what steps he took to redeem himself. We’re here to honour his memory, and I will do so, but I doubt I’ll ever be able to excuse what he did.”

“Hope the poor guy finally found some peace,” Deadman says under his breath in response, something chiding in his voice.

John Stewart catches her eyes, his own mirroring the fury in them. Dinah knows that if this weren’t a funeral, if it wasn’t out of respect for everybody that’s actually grieving, John would have stormed up there and decked Bruce himself.

And she’d have applauded.

But he bides his time until it’s his turn to go up to the podium and pay his respects. Then he makes a speech that very pointedly refuses to call Hal’s sacrifice a _redemption_ , but rather Hal being _true to himself_. To emphasise – at Bruce and anyone else thinking along the same lines – that what Hal did as Parallax was a deviation from the norm, and not the other way around.

Dinah’s happy to applaud that, instead.

She hadn’t meant to go up really, but after hearing John she can’t help herself. He watches her walk down the aisle toward him and immediately cedes the mic, smiling in both sympathy and to express a kind of camaraderie between them, in this. “I’m not really the one who should be talking to you,” she tells the crowd. “The man who should be up here in front of you – the man who knew Hal Jordan better than any of us – is Oliver Queen.” She pauses, swallowing around the lump in her throat. “But Ollie’s not with us anymore. They were… quite the pair. The Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer of our crowd. Which I guess makes me Becky Thatcher. Just along for the ride.”

Strained smile. Now’s not the time for self-pity. “They were a rare breed, both of them. They were heroes. No matter what else they did, what other paths their lives took, _they were heroes_. I doubt we’ll see their kind again, and now they’re gone. Ollie and Hal are finally reunited, Huck and Tom watching this from somewhere and sharing a good laugh over all the fuss we’re making.” She laughs herself, low and bittersweet. “That’s how I’ll always think of them.”

Clark comes looking for her, as soon as the ceremony is over. Everybody else is going on to watch them unveil the statue built to honour Hal’s sacrifice, but even the idea of it is too bizarre for her. It’s why you don’t fall in love with heroes, she muses. You eventually have to watch them get turned into stone.

Clark says, “That was pretty clever of you. Paying tribute to Ollie at a gathering as large as this.”

She turns to him from where she’s leaning against a tree, watching the cars beneath her drive down the hill to the memorial site. She doesn’t tell him that hadn’t been her intention. He wouldn’t understand – no one who didn’t know Hal and Ollie the way she did would. She hadn’t gone out of her way to mention Ollie, she’d just done the most natural thing. The pair had been two halves of the same soul.

“He deserved every bit of this, too,” Clark continues, regardless. “You were right to remind us of that.”

Dinah sends him a strained smile. “Us? Generous as always. You know you’re blameless, there.”

“Well, we were friends, in our own way,” Clark explains, his own smile sympathetic. “If Bruce and Hal got along better, we probably could have been more so.”

“Serves the both of you right for being level heads that know better, yet _still_ associating with actual human disasters.”

He laughs obligingly. “You overestimate the choice involved in friendship.”

“Yeah, maybe I do.” Dinah releases a rueful breath. “Clark? Can you… can you take me to him, please?”

“Of course.” His kind eyes are understanding and he holds a hand out for her to take. Quicker than she can blink, they’re up in the air, Clark supporting her by the small of her back in a kind of reverse-waltz. She leans against him gratefully, staying silent up until the pair of them are hovering above that familiar clump of trees.

There hadn’t been a body to bury, with Ollie. So they’d done what he would have wanted them to do with him – sent him off Robin Hood style. Shot an arrow as far as it would go, and then put up a gravestone where it landed.

It reads, _Oliver Queen. Always made the right enemies_.

That’s not entirely true, she muses with something like guilt filling her throat, but the sentiment stands.

“Here you go.” Clark brings her low enough to the ground that she can hop onto her feet gracefully. It’s just a little ways from the clearing where Ollie is. “Want me to wait?” he asks.

“Thanks… no, I can find my own way back.”

“Alright. You take care, Dinah.”

“You too.”

And then he goes, up-up-and-away. She pulls her leather jacket closer around herself, more for comfort than to ward against the twilight breeze. She doesn’t visit much, because truth told she never knows what to say to Ollie. For those last couple of years, when he’d still been alive, she’d forced her words down, after all. _Promise me you love me as much as I love you_.

Instead she had wallowed in anger because he couldn’t just pick up on it, until it all boiled over. And now it’s too late.

Today, at least, she can talk about Hal, she reasons, gathering up the courage to keep going. Remind them to look out for each other, up there. She passes the last thicket between herself and Ollie’s final resting place— and then she freezes.

Someone else is already there.

She’d been kneeling in front of the gravestone, but suddenly whips around as if she can sense Dinah behind her before she even sees her. One of her hands grabs the child at her side, pushing him back, shielding him from potential danger. A numbing feeling rolls down Dinah’s spine. She steps closer, two hands up in an “I come in peace” kind of gesture.

Shado’s eyes go wide. “Miss Lance,” she stammers, leaping to her feet.

“You,” Dinah acknowledges in a carefully neutral tone.

The colour is high in Shado’s unmasked face now as she gathers the bow and arrow she’d placed at her side so her hands could be free to burn the incense sticks she had brought with her. Her movements are scrambling, urgent. The little boy with her – couldn’t be older than one, two years old – gawks at Dinah, confused.

“I mean no disrespect. I’ll leave now.”

Dinah shakes her head, arms wrapping around herself again. “No, please, feel free.” And then, just to be cruel, “We shared him in life, I don’t see why the fuck I’d get to keep him to myself in death, either.”

“If you knew how badly I wish that were true, your hatred of me might be warranted,” Shado returns calmly. “But as it is, he was always yours. Please, one woman to another. Don’t do this in front of the child. He’s done nothing to you.”

Chastised, Dinah turns to look at him, _really_ look at him. He’s hardly grown since the last time she’d seen him. Small, slight. Almost sickly. “What did you name him?” Dinah asks around a lump that clogs up her throat.

“In which language?” Shado asks. It’s rhetorical. “Robert, after his father’s father.”

“Ollie hated his dad.”

“I didn’t know. I never knew him as you did.”

Dinah ignores that. “And his other name?”

“Takami.” Now she softens. “Written with the characters for _hawk_ and _bow_.”

“Takami,” Dinah repeats, bending to give him a tight smile. “Hello.”

“…Hello,” the boy obliges, shy.

Dinah turns to her again. She’s pried this much, she might as well go the whole mile. “Whose last name will he take?”

Shado seems almost amused by the question, in a bitter way. “I have none. Except for the name of the yakuza house I served. Oliver wouldn’t give him his own. Said he would never insult you in that way.”

At whatever she sees in Dinah’s face, then, she laughs under her breath. “Time and time again, I have explained our relationship to you. Yet you still seem surprised to learn you were truly the only woman in his heart.” She’s the one that sounds as if she’s suppressing anger, now. Fair, Dinah supposes.

“To borrow a cliché, it’s not you. It’s me.” Dinah shoves both her balled-up fists into her jacket pockets. “He was always looking for better because I couldn’t—” Choking on her words, Takami’s wide-eyed look in front of her, but she swallows down the emotion— “Give him what he wanted.”

There is silence, for a moment, as Shado takes her son by the hand and tugs him forward, making to leave. “You’re cruel, Miss Lance,” she says, before going. “If he could only love you if you had been able to give him children, then… why did he refuse to stay with me, when I _did_ bear him a son? Why was he so adamant about returning to you?”

Dinah stills.

“If what you really mean… is that his love was not enough for you, then… say that, instead of mocking me so unkindly.”

And then there’s only the sound of retreating footsteps. Dinah stares through blurred vision at the name on the gravestone, for a long moment, eyes wet and burning. And then, almost without intention, she screams, the Canary Cry startling the leaves off the treetops.

* * *

**Him. 2000.**

He’d almost lost consciousness, but then it happens. The tug. For a second he thinks it’s Kyle pulling at his hand for whatever reason, then registers that Kyle is, in fact, passed out in a heap by his side. Yet the pulling sensation on his finger persists, so he lifts it. The ring flies straight off, like someone’s… calling it to them.

And there’s only one person who can summon it like that.

The voice that follows doesn’t have the fury of a vengeful god, or the less-than-sane rage of a cold-blooded murderer with nothing more to lose, behind it. It’s just angry. It’s just human. “Get the hell away from them, Sinestro.”

Ollie figures the pain is making him hallucinate things. But when he closes his eyes, opens them, closes them and opens them again, that familiar blur of brown-green-black-brown is _right there_ in front of him, solid and real.

Up until it, and Sinestro, shoot up into the sky.

“…Kyle,” Ollie rasps. “ _Kyle_ ,” again, insistent, half-kicking at the limp body next to him. A cough and a gasp and then Kyle seems to startle into the land of the living again.

“Wh—? Where…?”

“Hal,” Ollie manages. It feels like there’s only breath enough in his chest for one more word, but he stubbornly clings to consciousness, doesn’t care if they’re the last thing he’ll ever say. “Go. I can’t. You go. He’ll need… backup. Take my…” _One more word, goddamn it all_ — “…Arrows.”

“Hal…?” Kyle repeats, then his eyes flick to the empty casket metres away from them, and he seems to understand.

“ _Please_ ,” Ollie grits out, wishing he could sound more desperate than angry, but Kyle’s his only hope and he’s _still fucking standing there_. “If Sinestro… again…”

He wants to continue along the lines, _I will flay you with a sharpening-knife and damn what my son thinks_ , but his tone betrays him. _I won’t survive it a second time_. It must be only the latter that Kyle hears, because he nods, gathers up some of Ollie’s arrows, and flies up in a beam of brilliant green.

Satisfied, Ollie gives his mind up to oblivion.

The next thing he registers is the warmth of flesh – human flesh warm with flowing blood, with the proof of _life_ – against his cheek. It must have been the emotional toll of seeing Hal’s body in that damn open casket combined with exhaustion from the fight and, you know, passing out, but when Ollie forces his eyes open and sees himself reflected in those browns, his own eyes sting and a thick lump fills his throat. “…Don’t,” Ollie warns, throwing one arm across his eyes, hiding them. “Don’t… talk to me right now.” _I’ll fucking cry_.

“Fine.” Ollie can hear the smile in Hal’s voice. “No talking.”

And then Hal’s lips crash against his.

* * *

He’d never really considered what a miracle the human body could be. As Spectre— hell, even as Parallax— Hal had humoured him by shifting into this form, but it had always only been limited, only the aesthetics of it. Hal’s curls and kind eyes and dimpled smile, but never the shape of the calluses on his fingers, or the warmth of his skin, or the right rhythm for his heartbeat. So now that Hal’s _in_ his actual body again, the both of them instantly – wordlessly – leap at the chance to finally make the most of it the way they’d never dared to as younger, self-conscious men.

It’s magical, and all that other sappy-romance-novel bullshit. Ollie wonders why he and Hal were ever afraid of this.

Hal’s like a man starved too, as if now that the dam’s been broken he _has_ to make up for lost time all in one night. As the millionth kiss gets far too wet and sloppy to not lead anywhere… else, Ollie laughs against Hal’s mouth and nudges him back. “Okay, _your_ body may have died at thirty-nine, but mine got stuck at forty-five, _and_ it took a hell of a beating from Sinestro. _Quit_.”

Hal grumbles something unintelligible into his sweat-slick chest, eyebrows furrowing in that petulant way they tend to, but he relents, just lying there on Ollie as Ollie wraps his arms around him. “How old am I actually?” he wonders out loud, and Ollie doesn’t even need to consider it first.

“Forty-two.”

“That was quick.” Hal exhales, amused. “Thought you said you could never keep people’s birthdays straight.”

“Wasn’t your birthday I kept track of,” Ollie answers, honest and somewhat melancholy.

Hal absently kisses the spot where his throat meets his chest. “Forty-eight?”

“Forty-eight,” Ollie confirms, forcing his lips into a cheerful half-a-grin again. “With a grand tally so far of… five girlfriends, one ex-wife, four kids, one grandkid.”

“And one…?” Hal asks. Humming, Ollie takes his hand and interlocks their fingers.

“Partner. In every sense of the word.”

“Aw.” Hal’s smile is teasing, but in a weirdly obligatory way, something perceptive in his eyes that doesn’t correspond. “Where does that leave things with the Bird Lady?” he asks, sure enough.

Ollie sighs. “I— jeez. I don’t know. When I got back, I started out just— giving her her space, you know, kind of like with Roy, and then… things progressed? And it doesn’t feel like getting back together is off the table anymore. We’re still separate, don’t get me wrong, but… I do think she’s warming up to the idea of trying again. I don’t wanna fuck that up, but— damn it, Hal, we _just_ figured this thing out, though…”

“You don’t wanna choose, do you?” Hal says it like he only just realised this, which Ollie can’t wrap his head around. Of _course_ he doesn’t wanna choose. Of course.

“Yeah, well. I grew up spoiled and all,” he jokes.

“You’ll have to, though. ’Cause it’s Dinah,” Hal warns, matter-of-factly, like knowing it doesn’t bother him at all. “She’s… troubled. Needs more reassuring from you than I do.”

“Why don’t you?” Ollie’s wanted to ask him for so long, and tonight is a night for all-or-nothing.

Hal smiles, tender. “Ollie— it’s so obvious, it’s criminal. You’re _this_ fucking happy to see me even after— you know?”

“It wasn’t obvious to Dinah, though. It wasn’t obvious to Roy.” Ollie swallows. “I can’t figure you out. It’s like… everybody speaks this language that I don’t. And I gotta learn it, to be able to get them, and for them to get me. Which takes time, you know? Learning? Time nobody seems to be able to spare me. ’Cept you. You…” Rueful exhale. “You even bothered to learn mine.”

Hal’s staring at him with something open and innocent in his eyes, like wonder. “…You say shit like that and then don’t understand how I can take this for granted.”

Ollie shrugs, oddly feeling more naked than he had when he’d stripped and tumbled Hal down onto the bed. “It was really fucking lonely without you,” he admits, quiet.

The emotion in the air lingers like a weighted blanket for quite a while, till Hal apparently can’t take it anymore, and tries to lighten things. “Listen to us. The years are really showing now, huh.”

Ollie takes his cue in relief. “Oh, yeah. It’s the only reason Dinah’s even willing to give me a shot again. Says Mia mellowed me out, made me all… cuddly.”

“Daughters tend to do that.”

“Good to see even _death_ couldn’t cure you of that antiquated outlook on gender.”

“Oliver Jonas Queen—”

Despite the pleasant ache in their muscles, they grab at each other, like boys wrestling, and at least for one effortless moment, nothing more complicated interrupts.

* * *

**Him. 2000.**

It’s funny, it isn’t until that exact moment that he realises he’s never seen Ollie blow up at Bruce before.

Not really. There’d been snarking – oh, plenty of snarking – and obligatory loaded gossip behind one another’s backs, but at the end of the day Ollie had always seemed to get along _marginally_ better with old Spooky than Hal ever had, or could. Maybe it’s to do with the changes in the nature of their relationship, now, maybe Ollie had been taking hits for Hal one too many times and it all reached critical levels today – whatever it is, Ollie actually leaps out of his seat like he has half a mind to _strangle_ Bruce, and has to be held at bay by Arthur and J’onn and Zatanna.

“Why the _fuck_ not!?” he demands, his voice so full of rage J’onn even seems to pick up on it empathically judging by how he takes a jerky step back. “His absolution was valid enough for _literal fucking God_ , but not you!?”

“It isn’t _personal_. I simply wouldn’t trust someone on a team with me if he has proven he has the capacity to turn against his own side before!”

“ _You’re_ gonna hold it over _Hal_ about turning against your own!? How about _you_ , huh, how about how you treat your fucking _kids_ , your son still comes crying to _mine_ whenever you—”

“Don’t you _dare_ go there, Oliver—”

“Why don’t we all just calm down and take this to a vote—” Ray tries, bless him, but Ollie’s on the warpath now and turns on him as well.

“If any of you have the _audacity_ to vote against reinstating Hal after _everything_ he’s done for this team, I’ll quit too.”

“You say that as if it would be a major loss,” Bruce spits out, seething.

“Watch it, Bruce,” Hal breaks his silence, indignant, but Ollie storms out regardless, and Hal’s left to glare his way out of this argument. “You know, everyone is showing _remarkable_ restraint on how you consistently try to undermine the democratic nature of this organisation—”

“What would _you_ know about restraint?” Bruce bites back.

“…I use it all the time to keep from calling you a _hypocritical man-child_ in official meetings, but I guess _fuck that_ , too, now.”

And fuck this, while they’re at it, Hal decides. He’d rather be making sure Ollie’s alright. He ignores whatever response Bruce is throwing at him, and leaves the Hall as well, makes for where he knows he’ll find Ollie in a mood – the observation deck. Ollie has his back to him, brooding in the general direction of the lifeless stars on the other side of the glass pane, so Hal wordlessly goes up and wraps his arms around Ollie’s waist, chin on his stiffening shoulder.

“It’s like they don’t care, like they don’t give a flying _fuck_ about you. About what you went through.”

“They don’t.” Hal shrugs, numb to it by this point. “And after what happened, you can’t really hold it against them.”

“I can and I fucking _will_ ,” Ollie stubbornly returns. “We’ve established that it wasn’t _you_. Why the hell can’t they just— accept it and _move on_ already?”

“Mourning my city and wanting power enough to save it? To play God? That was me. The Impurity couldn’t take hold without leverage, Ollie. It only magnified what was already… always there.”

“Well, if we’re going to stretch culpability _that_ thin, I wish Bruce fucking _chokes on a batarang_ , so I’m a murderer now.”

“You don’t really mean that.”

“That’s the thing, Hal, I _do_.” Ollie turns around, and his expression is wretched. “I _did_. Every single time I had to swallow it down when he talked about you like some kind of— of _rogue_. When I looked like the idiot for even _suggesting_ that you— that I _know_ you, you wouldn’t—” He pauses, averts his eyes, like even looking at Hal hurts. “And now that I’m _justified_ , I can’t— I _won’t_ hold my tongue anymore, they can’t just keep saying whatever the fuck they want, they clearly don’t know _or_ care enough about you to have earned that right.”

Hal fiddles with his ring. He’d known this moment had to come at some point, of course, but some naïve part of him had been hoping the bliss of the honeymoon period could have lasted a little while longer than this. “I guess we can’t avoid talking about it forever.”

“About what?”

“The part of you that resents me for putting you in that position in the first place,” Hal tells the ground.

“… _Hal_.”

“No, if I hadn’t done what I did, you wouldn’t need to be defending me—”

Ollie storms right up to his face and shoves a hand against his mouth, almost making Hal teeter backward. “Look. At me,” he demands, and Hal looks, and there’s raging, green fire in his eyes. “Do you honestly— _honestly_ — think. That there’s a _single_ thing. I wouldn’t forgive you for?”

Hal’s own eyes go wide as saucers, and maybe sting a little, too.

“Yeah. You did. You fucking killed a whole bunch of people and made me look you in the eyes while _I shot an arrow through your heart_ just to stop you before somebody less _attached_ could be roped in to do _worse_. Then you fucked off while I spiralled till I couldn’t stand the guilt a second longer, and chose to flush my own life down the same damn toilet, too, for a _chance_ to see you again. _Then_ you force me back as some kind of fucked-up atonement, and the first thing they make me see is some _kid_ wearing _your threads_ and they expect me to _take to him_ like he isn’t a constant reminder of you losing _everything_ , your home, your reputation, your _life_ , and one of those things by my—” and his voice cracks. “By my hand,” he continues, in a hiss. “Hal, you can’t even _hope_ to be sorry for any of it, so you better quit trying, ’cause for every part of me that resents you there _will_ be another that despises _myself_.”

Dear God. Dear God. Ollie can’t say _I love you_ , but he can say _that_. Hal’s heart swells with something too big for words, but he settles on pushing Ollie’s hand away and kissing him. Ollie kisses back the way he does everything else – aggressively and with all of his soul. “Pick Dinah,” Hal gasps out, the second they part.

Ollie stills. “…What?”

“Pick Dinah,” Hal repeats with renewed conviction. “I know where I stand with you. After tonight, there isn’t even a _shadow_ of a doubt. She— she doesn’t. Pick Dinah, Ollie. I wish— _goddamn_ , I wish you didn’t have to, but ’cause you do – pick her. She needs it more than I do.”

“I— but—”

“I should get in touch with Carol again.” He’s not sure he even means it, but if it’s the push Ollie needs, then…

He indulges in one last, tender kiss. “…Thank you.”

“You’re the actual _worst_ , Hal Jordan, the things you do to my—” Ollie swallows the rest of the words away, jerking his head back to the dead horizon again. “Don’t fucking _thank_ me. Ever. You, of all people, are supposed to be able to count on me being in your corner, understand?”

 _I love you_ , Hal wishes he could say instead, then, but he’s not sure that that would help Dinah, so he only hopes Ollie hears it as unmistakably as Hal hears him.

* * *

**Them. 2003.**

They’re on one of their aimless walks that Ollie has taken to calling “rambles”, ever since he vacationed in Nottingham, up the piece of hilly woodland that forms a half-circle around their corner of the city. The afternoon sun is bright and could have been unbearable if it wasn’t for the cover of the trees. Dinah can close her eyes to listen to the birds singing without a worry, Ollie’s hand around her waist leading her onward safely. “I’m happy,” she whispers, unprompted. “Probably the closest to completely happy I have ever been.”

“Closest?” Ollie repeats wryly. “What am I still doing wrong?”

Dinah opens her eyes, cocks her head up to look at her husband, at the streaks of gray along the side of his head tucked behind his ear, and what a fortune aging can be, she muses. “’Course you focus on that part. Cynic.”

“Realist,” Ollie corrects, with a laugh into the top of her head that turns into a sweet kiss. “Hungry yet, milady?”

“Mm,” Dinah agrees. It’s just past lunch-time. Mia probably cooked.

So they start downward in the direction of home. Home. Dinah exhales, amused, thinking of how taken aback her younger self would have been at the idea of calling this little bubble of middle-class suburbia _home_ , city girl that she’d been. But then, Ollie’s shitty old apartment down at the Core had been home too, then Sherwood Florist’s. And now their sell-out, single family detached with the literal white picket fence. So maybe it wasn’t where or what the house was like, maybe home was just… them.

“Penny for your thoughts.”

“Nothing.” Dinah smiles up at him. “It’s the weather. It’s languid. Makes me all… nostalgic and introspective.”

“Only about good things, I hope.” Ollie reaches down and brushes the hair away from her face.

“The best,” Dinah confirms, content.

Roy’s rust-coloured truck is parked in the driveway when the house is finally within sight. He’d moved in across from them, but had been visiting his friends on the East Coast for the past week or so, which means this is a nice surprise. “Oh, he’s back,” Ollie remarks as well, something pleased in his voice. But they go round to the back regardless, entering the house that way. Dinah’s mind is firmly on lunch, by this point, so she’s about to call for Mia and ask if she’d started something or if Dinah should push Ollie into whipping up the quickest meal he can, but she barely has the chance to open her mouth before Ollie shushes her.

“Listen.” He jabs a thumb in the direction of the kitchen, the door to which is a few metres away from them in the small shoe-room-slash-laundry-room they’re standing in, propped open by an errant piece of clothing that must have fallen off of somebody’s washing basket.

“—It’s true,” Roy’s voice wafts toward them, sounding determined. “He never holds anything against you, you’re his favourite.”

Dinah thinks for a fearful second that he and Connor are having a rare argument, but registers that there’s no accusation in Roy’s tone, just statement.

“I’m _not_ his favourite! Dad doesn’t play favourites.”

“Mi, am I right or am I right?”

“He’s right, you know,” Mia’s voice agrees sagely. “You’re, like, the only person in the world who can tell him what to do and get away with it.”

“Oh, come _on_.”

“Seriously, Connor.” Roy again. “If you tell him first, he’s not gonna get mad at you, and _then_ I can sort of… segue in.”

“First off, you’re both nuts, he doesn’t play favourites, and second, why should I, when your news is way more unexpected than mine? …He’s probably guessed I was gonna… you know… for a while now.”

“ _Probably_ ,” Roy repeats, snorting.

“…Okay, so maybe it’s a little nerve-wracking for me, too…”

“You boys are _so_ in trouble,” Mia sing-songs, delighted.

“That doesn’t bode well,” Ollie observes flatly, under his breath.

Dinah sighs in agreement. “Shall we?”

They push the door fully open at the same time. Roy and Connor both whip around with identical deer-in-the-headlights expressions on their faces, while Mia revels in her Cheshire-Cat grin.

“Dad!”

“Ollie!”

“…Boys,” Ollie greets, half-sarcastic, one questioning eyebrow arched.

“Connor’s moving in with Kyle. Like, he’s moving to San Francisco,” Roy blurts out.

“Wh—!” Connor splutters with a helpless, comically betrayed look of shock. “Well, that’s a city away! Roy’s moving in with _Dick_ , all the way to New York!”

“ _Et tu_ , Hawke…”

Ollie stares at them both, processing. His silence makes Dinah wince, and even Mia looks like she doesn’t find this quite as funny anymore. The boys, for their part, are all guilt.

“Dad, I swear, it’s just San Francisco, I can visit every weekend—”

“—Nothing to do with not appreciating how _well_ we all managed to reconnect, Ollie, it’s been amazing, only… Dick needs me—”

Ollie holds a hand up to stop them both. “It’s fine, I’m fine, it’s just— I wasn’t expecting it.” He sighs, making a _look-at-you_ kind of hand-wave in Connor’s direction. “I mean, Connor, it— it was a matter of time, you’re twenty-three, you’re clearly very much in love— who am I to contest that…?”

“…Not that you haven’t. Often. And loudly,” Connor points out with a playful, if wry, smile.

“Come on, when have I ever not let you – any of you – do what you want, at the end of the day?”

“It’s not that, Dad. I know how much you liked having me in the house. I loved it, too. And Roy being across the road, after everything…”

“Man, you’re determined to pin more of this on me, aren’t you,” Roy grumbles half-heartedly, but his eyebrows are furrowed in concern, too. “Ollie…”

“You know how I feel about Dick,” Ollie says, more warning than admonition. “He _will_ hurt you again, Roy.”

“Well, this time, there’s context you’re missing.” Roy’s smile is suddenly self-conscious, fighting against itself to not be obvious. “…You might be a grandfather again.”

They all turn to stare, incredulous. Dinah can see her own joy mirrored in Mia’s and Connor’s faces, but Ollie looks shocked.

“Hold on – that can’t happen _accidentally_ , with Dick, can it…? I, uh, don’t really get how it works…”

Roy shakes his head in confirmation. “It doesn’t, usually. And there’s the catch – Dick asked. ’Cept it was more like… he wanted a kid from me, but didn’t feel like he had the right to want _me_.”

“So in his head… he was just gonna raise your kid on his own?” Connor frowns.

Roy nods, somewhat bittersweet.

“Tragic _and_ fucked up,” Mia remarks, scrunching up her nose.

“ _We’re_ kind of fucked up,” Roy reasons with a shrug. “Anyway, the point is— I’m not letting him buy into what his mind is clearly convinced of. That he and I can’t ever… be. So I’m moving and I realise this is all happening the wrong way around but I love him and I want to and I’m moving.” All in one breath. “…Sorry. I liked this. I really did. We’ll visit. Obviously. …Okay?”

His eyes are on his father as he asks it, not her. Dinah sends Ollie a nervous sideways glance. Poor thing. He’d been so glad to have Roy close to them again.

Ollie sighs, ruffling the hair on the back of his head the way he does when he’s agitated and doesn’t want to show it. “Of course it’s _okay_. It’s your life, not mine. I’ll miss ya, is all. Like crazy.”

Roy steps closer and engulfs Ollie in a hug that he returns fiercely. “I know, Dad. I’ll miss you too. All of you.”

With wetter eyes than Dinah had expected, Connor goes and disappears into the hug, too.

“…I’m very, _very_ proud of you both,” Ollie tells them, voice gruff. “You have become— _outstanding_ men, and— I hope the world out there is kind, and you get everything you deserve…”

“ _Shut up_ , I don’t wanna cry…”

“So, uh…” Mia interrupts, cheeks flushed. “This would be a pretty bad time to bring up college applications, huh?”

“ _Mia!_ ”

It’s only when Roy’s gone home and Connor and Mia have made a tactical retreat by offering to finish the week’s grocery shopping that Ollie lets himself be visibly upset at all. “I thought empty nest syndrome was supposed to happen after they leave _one at a time_ ,” he grumbles. “Isn’t that the _point_ of having three?”

“Poor baby.” Dinah gives him a sympathetic smile against his cheek as she kisses it, over and over again until she earns a grudging smile. “Look at it this way. It’s a clean cut. You don’t have to suffer three times over.”

“Har-har.”

“I’m serious. Anyway, we can just go back to our lavish DINK lifestyle – like it used to be back in Seattle.”

“Yeah! Let’s sell the house and buy back our apartment. Serves them right, when they _want_ a family gathering, they’re gonna have to be crammed into it and question their choices.”

“You’d miss the outdoor barbecues too much,” Dinah counters, chuckling. “Face it, Oliver Queen. You’re a _dad_ dad. No takebacks.”

Ollie sulks into the crook of her neck, so she kisses his exposed temple softly.

The door to the living room opens, then, and Hal’s face peers around it, almost sheepish. “…Greetings. Roy told me the story and said, uh, some cheering up might be needed, so… here I am?”

“Excuse you, I’ve been doing the cheering just fine,” Dinah returns, no actual bite in it.

“I’m _old_ , Hal,” Ollie complains, holding both hands out melodramatically, which Hal takes and then squeezes as he steps closer.

“Hey, _I’m_ glad you are. It’s better than the alternative.”

“We keep you young, don’t we, baby?” Dinah teases, grinning against his cheek, and Ollie rolls his eyes.

“Nobody takes my suffering seriously in this house.”

Dinah laughs. “I’ll make dinner tonight as penance. Hal, give him his snuggles, won’t you?”

She starts to get off the couch, and Ollie stops her by the wrist, his pouting definitely exaggerated, now. “’Nother kiss?”

“You’re not _old_ , you’re a giant _baby_.” Dinah sighs, leans down and gives him a peck on the lips regardless. At least Ollie’s grinning into it, so he must feel better, she acknowledges.

“Me next,” Hal teases, a twinkle dancing in his eyes.

Dinah shakes her head like she’s playing along, but it puts her in a contemplative mood all the way into the kitchen as she goes through the motions of prepping their meal. Hal finds her spaced out, like that, when he enters about twenty minutes later for some water. “Earth to Dinah?” he tries.

“Oh— hey, Hal.” She laughs, blushing. “Sorry, I was just…”

“Yeah, I know, poor Ollie, huh?” Hal sends her an understanding smile. “It’s not fair how late in life he got to have a real family. Time’s absolutely relentless, I still can’t believe Lian’s _eight_.”

“It is,” Dinah agrees, absently chopping up what’s left of the carrots on her board.

“He’ll be alright, though. We’re here.”

“…We are,” Dinah repeats again, and this time Hal definitely hears the faraway quality of her voice.

“Everything okay?”

“Hal.” Dinah looks up, meeting his eyes, sombre. “You ever notice how… that works? I-I mean, us? Me and you. And him. Like a… unit.”

“I… guess?” Hal frowns, putting his glass of water down on the countertop next to her. “You’re his wife, I’m his best friend.”

Dinah sets the knife down and fully turns to him. “Are you?” She keeps her tone soft. “You and Ollie… it’s not platonic, is it? It’s never been. Right?”

Hal stills. He averts his eyes, almost ashamed, which is not what Dinah was aiming for but isn’t sure how to fix, now. “…You knew that, though. I thought— we don’t _say_ it.”

“We don’t,” Dinah agrees. “But… maybe we should. Maybe it’s time.”

“For what, Dinah?” And the way he says her name – like he means to say _sweetheart_ , or something. She smiles tenderly.

“It just… doesn’t make sense to me that we have all this extra room, now, and you’re still driving or flying down here from miles away. I get rebuilding Coast City is important to you, but— you don’t really have to _live_ there, do you? Isn’t it unhealthy, clinging to the past like that? You and Carol don’t seem to be considering getting back together anytime soon either, so…”

“So… what?” Musing, almost. “You think I should move in?”

Dinah shrugs. “You and Ollie are…”

“I would never disrespect you like that.”

“With my blessing,” Dinah clarifies. “He’d love it, Hal. And I daresay he needs it right now.”

Hal takes her hands in his, looking at them instead of meeting her eyes. “Just your blessing? Not your… participation?”

“Oh, Hal, you’ve always been more…”

“Still? I’m almost mad on his behalf you don’t see how important you are…”

“No, I _know_ , but…”

“Can I ask you seriously?” Hal squeezes her hands once. “Did I miss my chance, if I ever had it?”

“…You had it.” Dinah squeezes back, smiling tightly. “Of course you did.”

Hal’s eyes finally flick upward, but they pause at her lips and she can tell. The pull is like gravity – impossible to fight. Before she’s even conscious of it, she’s leaning forward, and so is he, and then… they’re kissing.

“…What, is it my birthday?”

Startling, she and Hal practically leap apart, faces flushed, guilty. Ollie’s standing at the doorway, his expression unreadable. “O-Ollie, I know how this looks, but—” Hal starts, but before he can continue Ollie holds a hand up with a sigh and steps closer. Dinah’s heart is hammering in her chest, and she feels like she could cry.

“I don’t… need an explanation. Look, I know you two had history long before I came in, and—”

“What?” Hal sends him an almost upset look. “Ollie, I broke things off between us because I _wanted_ you two to be together, like you should be—”

“You did that?” Dinah jerks her head up, eyes stinging. “What the _hell_ , Hal, you’re both royal idiots, can’t you _see_ how much like soulmates you have always been—”

And now Ollie’s upset, too. “Di, I _have_ tried and I _am_ trying to be better at showing this, so what is it gonna take for you to believe that there’s _no one_ I’d rather be with—”

“Wait, wait, wait, hold on, stop.” Hal pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration. “So— clearly, we _all_ have the wrong idea about… this.”

Dinah averts her eyes. As if unable to bear it, Ollie comes up to her and wraps an arm around her shoulders. “…I have never wanted to choose, for the record,” he confesses. “I know it’s a lot to ask for, I know I’m being selfish, but it’s the truth – both of you. Both of you… are as inalienable to me as my hands and feet, and I couldn’t survive without either one, I _couldn’t_.”

“Me neither!” Dinah blurts out like an accusation, tears falling. “And I’ve _had_ to. And it fucking _hurt_.”

“I thought I was doing what was best for you both.” Hal seems dumbfounded, staring from one to the other of them, his expression lost. “Taking myself out of the equation. Are you saying…?”

“I didn’t _want_ you out of the equation,” says Dinah.

“You and me are in the same damn parentheses, idiot,” says Ollie.

“Okay… okay, okay, so… what does this _mean_ , going forward?”

“…For a start,” Dinah tries again, “You could move in.”

Ollie smiles down at her, warmly amused. “You asked him to move in?”

Dinah colours. “You still have a family. In us.”

“I don’t know how the hell I managed to end up here after all the things I’ve done,” Hal cuts in, emotion thick in his voice, “But Dinah, I’ve kissed you already, and I haven’t kissed Ollie in years – so if you don’t object…”

Ollie answers for her, stepping forward and pulling Hal toward him by the back of his neck, rougher than he would have with her but the motion seems to hammer the point home. Even kissing, Hal looks wretched, half-disbelieving. But when they part, it’s like everything softens, and the look in their eyes as their foreheads touch is one Dinah knows very dearly, very well.

She smiles to herself, wiping her tears away with a sharp slide of one arm across her eyes, embarrassed to be this emotional about it all. “I’ll, um. Finish dinner. So. You two should… catch up, if you want.”

Hal turns to her and gently takes her hand. “Will you join in for… dessert?”

“Mercy on my stamina.” Ollie laughs. “Happy to watch, though. In fact, I’m _sure_ I must have dreamt up something like this, at some point…”

“Oh, trust you to take the romance out of everything.” Dinah gives him an unimpressed swat on his backside and earns a yelp. “ _Go_.”

“Love you, Di,” Hal throws over his shoulder with half a grin as he pulls Ollie along by the hand.

Dinah can’t stop smiling, either, and as she returns to her vegetables she thinks – _love you too_ – at them both.

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t know how many people would be interested in this corner of the DCU, so I’d really appreciate all the bookmarks, kudos, and comments you have to spare! You can find me on Tumblr as monarchgender. I also have a handy guide to getting into GA comics [here](https://arrowswing.tumblr.com/post/637041231926607872/in-honour-of-his-birthday-and-because-so-many-of), if this has piqued your interest.


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